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GEO.  A.  wheele: 


THE 


By  HAL  a  EVARTS 

Author  of  THE  CROSS  PULL 


CAL  HARRIS  came  to  the  Three  Bar  ranch  with  his 
gun  swung  in  his  belt  in  front— "the  quickest  draw  in 
the  world  for  them  that  can  use  it"— and  although  the 
men,  most  of  them,  had  a  grudge  against  him  because  he 
gt-jntle-broke  his  horses  and  believed  in  fencing  off  the  open 
range,  it  was  pretty  Billie  Warren,  mistress  of  the  ranch, 
\\  ho  most  resented  his  coming.  Billie's  father,  wishing  to 
cement  an  old  family  friendship,  had  willed  a  half  interest 
in  the  ranch  to  the  son  of  his  old  friend  Bill  Harris,  with  the 
stipulation  that  his  daughter  and  Cal  must  both  live  on  the 
ranch  and  work  it  together  for  the  three  years  after 
his  death,  and  if  either  one  left,  the  other  should  have  all 
claim  to  the  ranch.  Billie  didn't  understand  his  motive 
and  she  suspected  Harris  of  swindling  her  father  for  his 
own  ends.  Moreover,  she  was  worried  over  the  steady  loss 
of  cattle  in  large  numbers,  and  the  unwelcome  advances  of 
a  nearby  cattle  owner.  So  Cal  found  it  rather  unpleasant 
at  first.  But  he  could  manage  men  and  women  and  he 
soon  made  it  his  business  to  inquire  into  the  troubles  of 
the  Three  Bar  ranch,  —  and.  then  there  was  action  a-plenty. 

^  Evarts  knows  the  open  range  and  the  people  who  live 
there,  comic  and  tragic,  good  and  bad,  but  always  lively 
human  beings.  A  colorful  story  of  a  virile  young  ranch- 
m.an's  fight  for  the  rights  of  the  honest  stock  raisers  and 
for  the  interests  of  the  girl  he  loved,  "The  Settling  of  the 
Sage"  will  have  a  wide  appeal. 


THE  SETTLING  OF  THE  SAGE 


Ig  l|al  eg.  lEbwctB 


The  Cross  Pull 

The  Yellow  Horde 

The  Passing  of  the  Old  West 

The  Bald    Face:    and    Other 

Animal  Stories 
The  Settling  of  the  Sage 


i 


His  knees  sagged  under  him  as  a  forty-five  slug  struck 
him  an  inch  above  the  buckle  of  his  belt. 
Frontispiece.  See  page  296. 


THE    SETTLING    OF 

THE    SAGE 


BY 

HAL  G.  EVARTS 


WITH    ILLUSTRATIONS    BY 

DOUGLAS  DUER 


BOSTON 

LITTLE,   BROWN,  AND   COMPANY 

1922 


Copyright,  19S2y 
By  Hal  G.  Evarts. 


All  rights  reserved 
Published  January,  1922 


^ 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


a  \  1 

ER35 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


PAGE 

His  knees  saggad  under  him  as  a  forty-five  slug 
struck  him  an  inch  above  the  buckle  of  his 
belt      .         .         .         .         .         .         .     Frontispiece 

The  man  pulled  up  his  horse  to  view  a  sign  that 

stood  at  the  forks  .....  3 

"I  want  you  !  "  he  said.     "  Throw  in  with  me, 

girl" 170 

"It's  been  right  lonesome  planning  without  a 
little  partner  to  talk  it  all  over  with  at 
night,"  he  said 299 


ivi575150 


THE  SETTLING  OF  THE  SAGE 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage 


A  RIDER  jogged  northward  along  the  road  on 
a  big  pinto  horse,  a  led  buckskin,  packed,  trailing 
a  half-length  behind.  The  horseman  traveled 
with  the  regulation  outfit  of  the  roaming  range 
dweller — saddle,  bed  roll  and  canvas  war  bag 
containing  personal  treasures  and  extra  articles 
of  attire — but  this  was  supplemented  by  two  pan- 
niers of  food  and  cooking  equipment  and  a  one- 
man  teepee  that  was  lashed  on  top  in  lieu  of 
canvas  pack  cover.  A  ranch  road  branched  off 
to  the  left  and  the  man  pulled  up  his  horse  to 
view  a  sign  that  stood  at  the  forks. 

"  Squatter,  don't  let  the  sun  go  down  on  you," 
he  read,  "  That's  the  third  one  of  those  re- 
minders, Calico,"  he  told  the  horse.  "  The  word- 
ing a  little  different  but  the  sentiment  all  the 


same." 


Fifty  yards  off  the  trail  the  charred  and  black- 
ened fragments  of  a  wagon  showed  in  sharp  con- 
trast to  the  bleached  white  bones  of  two  horses. 

"  They  downed  his  team  and  torched  his 
worldly  goods,"  the  rider  said.  "All  his  hopes 
gone  up  in  smoke." 


4  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

He  turned  in  his  saddle  and  looked  off  across 
the  unending  expanse  of  sage.  Coldriver — prob- 
ably so  named  from  the  fact  that  the  three  wells 
in  the  town  constituted  the  only  source  of  water 
within  an  hour's  ride — lay  thirty  miles  to  the 
south,  a  cluster  of  some  forty  buildings  nestling 
on  a  wind-swept  flat.  Seventy  miles  beyond  it, 
and  with  but  two  more  such  centers  of  civilization 
between,  the  railroad  stretched  across  the  rolling 
desolation.  North  of  him  the  hills  lifted  above 
the  sage,  angling  with  the  directions  so  that  four 
miles  along  the  Three"  Bar  road  that  branched 
off  to  the  left  would  bring  him  to  their  foot  and  a 
like  distance  along  the  main  fork  saw  its  termina- 
tion at  Brill's  store,  situated  in  a  dent  in  the  base  „ 
of  the  hills,  the  end  of  the  Coldriver  Trail.  ^ 

The  man  took  one  more  look  at  the  evidence 
left  behind  to  prove  that  the  sign  was  no  empty 
threat  before  heading  the  paint-horse  along  the 
left-hand  fork.  The  crisp  cool  of  early  spring 
was  blown  down  from  the  slope  of  the  hills.  Old 
drifts,  their  tops  gray-streaked  with  dust,  lay 
banked  in  the  gulches  and  on  sheltered  east 
slopes,  but  the  new  grass  had  claimed  the  range 
to  the  very  foot  of  the  drifts,  the  green  of  it  in- 
tensified in  patches  watered  by  the  trickle  that.l 
seeped  from  the  downhill  extremities  of  the  snow  | 
banks.  He  noted  that  the  range  cows  along  his 
route  were  poor  and  lean,  their  hip  bones  showing 
lumpily  through  sagging  skin,  giving  them  the 


ill 


The  man  pulled  up  his  horse  to  view  a  sign  that  stood 
at  the  forks.     Page  3. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  5 

appearance  of  milkers  rather  than  of  beef  stock. 
The  preceding  summer  had  been  hot  and  dry, 
browning  the  range  six  weeks  before  its  time,  and 
the  stock  had  gone  into  the  winter  in  poor  shape. 
Heavy  snowfalls  had  completed  the  havoc  and 
ten  per  cent,  of  the  range  stock  had  been  winter- 
killed. Those  that  had  pulled  through  were 
slow  in  putting  on  weight  and  recovering  their 
strength. 

A  big  red  steer  stood  broadside  to  him,  the 
Three  Bar  brand  looming  on  its  side,  and  the  man 
once  more  pulled  up  his  horse  and  lost  himself  in 
retrospection  as  he  gazed  at  the  brand. 

"  The  old  Three  Bar,  Calico,"  he  remarked  to 
the  horse.  "The  old  home  brand.  It's  been 
many  a  moon  since  last  1  laid  an  eye  on  a  Three 
Bar  cow." 

The  man  was  gazing  directly  at  the  steer  but 
he  no  longer  saw  it.  Instead  he  was  picturing 
the  old-time  scenes  that  the  sight  of  the  brand  re- 
called. Step  by  step  he  visioned  the  long  trail 
of  the  Three  Bar  cows  from  Dodge  City  to  the 
I^latte,  from  the  Platte  to  the  rolling  sage-clad 
hills  round  old  Fort  Laramie  and  from  Laramie 
to  the  present  range.  Many  times  he  had  heard 
the  tale,  and  though  most  of  the  scenes  had  been 
enacted  before  his  birth,  they  were  impressed  so 
firmly  upon  his  mind  by  repetition  that  it  seemed 
as  if  he  himself  had  been  a  part  of  them. 

His  mind  pictured  two  boys  of  somewhere 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage 


round  eighteen  years  of  age  setting  forth  from 
the  little  home  town  of  Kansas  City,  nestling  at 
the  confluence  of  the  Missouri  and  the  Kaw.  A 
year  later  Cal  Warren  was  whacking  bulls  on  the 
Santa  Fe  Trail  while  the  other,  William  Harris, 
was  holding  the  reins  over  four  plunging  horses 
as  he  tooled  a  lumbering  Concord  stage  over  the 
trail  from  Omaha  to  the  little  camp  called  Den- 
ver. 

It  was  five  years  before  their  trails  crossed 
again.  Cal  Warren  was  the  first  of  the  two  to 
wed,  and  he  had  established  a  post  along  the  trail, 
a  rambling  sti-ucture  of  'dobe,  poles  and  sod,  and 
there  conducted  the  business  of  "  Two  for  One," 
a  calling  impossible  and  unknown  in  any  other 
than  that  day  and  place. 

The  long  bull  trains  were  in  sight  from  horizon 
to  horizon  every  hour  of  the  day.  The  grind  of 
the  gravel  wore  down  the  hoofs  of  the  unshod 
oxen,  and  when  footsore  they  could  not  go  on. 
One  sound  bull  for  two  with  tender  feet  was 
Warren's  rule  of  trade.  These  crippled  ones 
were  soon  made  sound  in  the  puddle  pen,  a  sod 
corral  flooded  with  sufficient  water  to  puddle  the 
yellow  clay  into  a  six-inch  layer  of  stiff,  healing 
mud,  then  thrown  out  on  the  open  range  to  fatten 
and  grow  strong.  But  transitions  were  swift 
and  sweeping.  Steel  rails  were  crowding  close 
behind  the  prairie  schooners  and  the  ox-bows. 
Bull  trains  grew  fewer  every  year  and  eventually 


n 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  7 

Cal  Warren  made  his  last  trade  of  two  for 
one. 

Bill  Harris  had  come  back  to  view  the  railroad 
of  which  he  had  heard  so  much  and  he  remained 
to  witness  and  to  be  a  part  of  the  wild  days  of 
Abilene,  Hays  and  Dodge,  as  each  attained  the 
apex  of  its  glory  as  the  railroad's  end  and  the 
consequent  destination  of  the  Texas  trail  herds. 
The  sight  of  these  droves  of  thousands  implanted 
a  desire  to  run  cows  himself  and  when  he  was  wed 
ill  Dodge  he  broached  this  project  to  his  boyhood 
pal. 

It  was  the  sincere  wish  of  each  to  gain  the  other 
as  a  partner  in  all  future  enterprise,  but  this  was 
not  to  be,  Warren  had  seen  the  bottom  drop  out 
of  the  bull  trade  and  he  would  not  relinquish  the 
suspicion  that  any  business  dealing  in  four-footed 
stock  was  hazardous  in  the  extreme  and  he  in- 
sisted that  the  solution  of  all  their  financial  prob- 
lems rested  upon  owning  land,  not  cows.  Har- 
ris could  not  be  induced  to  farm  the  soil  while 
steers  were  selling  round  eight  dollars  a  head. 

Warren  squatted  on  a  quarter  of  land.  Harris 
bought  a  few  head  of  she-stock  and  grazed  his 
cows  north  and  west  across  the  Kansas  line  into 
the  edge  of  the  great  unknown  that  was  styled 
Nebraska  and  Northwest  District.  At  first  his 
range  was  limitless,  but  in  a  few  short  years  he 
could  stand  on  the  roof  of  his  sod  hut  and  see 
the  white  points  of  light  which  were  squatters' 


8  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

wagons  dotting  the  range  to  the  far  horizon  in 
any  direction  he  chose  to  look.  The  first  of  these 
to  invade  his  range  had  been  Cal  Warren,  moving 
on  before  the  swarm  of  settlers  flocking  into  the 
locality  of  his  first  choice  in  such  alarming  nmn- 
bers  that  he  feared  an  unhealthy  congestion  of 
humanity  in  the  near  future.  The  debate  of 
farming  versus  cows  was  resumed  between  the 
two,  but  each  held  doggedly  to  his  own  particular 
views  and  the  longed-for  partnership  was  again 
postponed. 

Harris  moved  once  more — and  then  again — 
and  it  was  something  over  two  decades  after  his 
departure  from  Dodge  with  the  Three  Bar  cows 
that  he  made  one  final  shift,  faring  on  in  search  of 
that  land  where  nesters  were  unknown.  He 
made  a  dry  march  that  cost  him  a  fourth  of  his 
cow^s,  skirted  the  Colorado  Desert  and  made  his 
stand  under  the  first  rim  of  the  hills.  Those 
others  who  came  to  share  this  range  were  men 
whose  views  were  identical  with  his  own,  whose 
watchword  was:  "  Our  cows  shall  run  free  on  a 
thousand  hills."  They  sought  for  a  spot  where 
the  range  was  untouched  by  the  plow  and  the 
water  holes  unfenced.  They  had  moved,  then 
moved  again,  driven  on  before  the  invasion  of  the 
settlers.  These  men  banded  together  and  swore 
that  here  conditions  should  be  reversed,  that  it 
was  the  squatter  who  should  move,  and  on  this 
principle  they  grimly  rested. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  9 

Cal  Warren  had  been  the  vanguard  of  each 
new  rush  of  settlers  that  had  pushed  Bill  Harris 
on  to  another  range,  and  the  cowman  had  come  to 
see  the  hand  of  fate  in  this  persistence.  The 
nesters  streamed  westward  on  all  the  trails,  filing 
their  rights  on  the  fertile  valleys  and  pushing 
those  who  would  be  cattle  barons  undisputed 
back  into  the  more  arid  regions.  When  the 
Warren  family  found  him  out  again  and  halted 
their  white-topped  wagon  before  his  door.  Bill 
Harris  gave  it  up. 

'*  I've  come  up  to  see  about  getting  that  part- 
nership fixed  up,  Bill,"  Warren  greeted.  "  You 
know — the  one  we  talked  over  in  Dodge  a  while 
ago,  about  our  going  in  together  when  either  of 
us  changed  his  mind.  Well,  I've  changed  mine. 
Tve  come  to  see  that  running  cows  is  a  good 
game,  Bill,  so  let's  fix  it  up.  I've  changed  my 
mind." 

''  That  was  twenty  years  ago,  Cal,"  Harris 
said.  "  But  it  still  holds  good — only  I've 
changed  my  mind  too.  You  was  dead  right 
from  the  first.  Squatters  will  come  to  roost  on 
every  foot  of  ground  and  there'll  come  a  day 
when  I'll  have  to  turn  squatter  myself — so  I 
might  as  well  start  now.  The  way  to  get  used  to 
crowds,  Cal,  is  to  go  where  the  crowds  are  at. 
I'm  headed  back  for  Kansas  and  you  better 
come  along.  We'll  get  that  partnership  fixed 
up." 


lo  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

A  single  child  had  come  to  bless  each  union  in 
the  parents'  late  middle  age.  The  Harris  heir,  a 
boy  of  eight,  had  been  named  Calvin  in  honor  of 
his  father's  friend.  Cal  Warren  had  as  nearly 
returned  the  compliment  as  circumstances  would 
permit,  and  his  three-year-old  daughter  bore  the 
name  of  Williamette  Ann  for  both  father  and 
mother  of  the  boy  who  was  his  namesake,  and 
Warren  styled  her  Billie  for  short. 

Each  man  was  as  stubbornly  set  in  his  new 
views  as  he  had  been  in  the  old.  The  Harrises 
came  into  possession  of  the  Warrens'  prairie 
schooner  and  drove  off  to  the  east.  The  War- 
rens took  over  the  Three  Bar  brand  and  the  little 
Williamette  Ann  slept  in  the  tiny  bunk  built  for 
the  son  of  the  Harris  household. 

For  a  space  of  minutes  these  old  pictures  occu- 
pied the  mind  of  the  man  on  the  pinto  horse. 
The  led  buckskin  moved  fretfully  and  tugged  on 
the  lead  rope,  rousing  the  man  from  his  abstrac- 
tion. Distant  strings  of  prairie  schooners  and 
ox-bows  faded  from  his  mind's  eye  and  he  was 
once  more  conscious  of  the  red  steer  with  the 
Three  Bar  brand  that  had  stirred  up  the  train  of 
reflections.  He  turned  for  another  glimpse  of 
the  distant  sign  as  he  headed  the  paint-horse 
along  the  road. 

"All  that  was  quite  a  spell  back,  Calico,"  he 
said.  "  Old  Bill  Harris  planted  the  first  one  of 
those  signs,  and  it  served  a  good  purpose  then. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  1 1 

It's  a  sign  that  stands  for  lack  of  progress  to-day. 
Times  change,  and  it's  been  eighteen  years  or  so 
since  old  Bill  Harris  left." 

The  road  traversed  the  bench,  angled  down  a 
side  hill  to  a  valley  somewhat  more  than  a  mile 
ac.TOSS.  Calico  pricked  his  ears  sharply  toward 
the  Three  Bar  buildings  that  stood  at  the  upper 
end  of  it. 

Curious  eyes  peered  from  the  bunk  house  as  he 
neared  it,  for  the  paint-horse  and  the  buckskin 
were  not  without  fame  even  if  the  man  himself 
were  a  stranger  to  them  all.  For  the  better  part 
of  a  year  the  two  high-colored  horses  had  been 
seen  on  the  range, — south  to  the  railroad,  west  to 
the  Idaho  line.  The  man  had  kept  to  himself 
and  when  seen  by  approaching  riders  he  had  al- 
ways been  angling  on  a  course  that  would  miss 
their  own.  Those  who  had,  out  of  curiosity,  de- 
liberately ridden  out  to  intercept  him  reported 
that  he  seemed  a  decent  sort  of  citizen,  willing  to 
converse  on  any  known  topics  except  those  which 
concerned  himself. 

He  dropped  from  the  saddle  before  the  bunk 
house  and  as  he  stood  in  the  door  he  noted  half  a 
dozen  men  lounging  on  the  bunks.  This  indo- 
lence apprised  him  of  the  fact  that  they  were 
extra  men  signed  on  for  the  summer  season  and 
that  their  pay  had  not  yet  started,  for  the  cow- 
hand, when  on  the  pay  roll,  works  sixteen  hours 
daily  and  when  he  rests  or  frolics  it  is,  except  in 


12  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

rare  instances,  on  his  own  time  and  at  his  own 
expense. 

A  tall,  lean  individual,  who  sat  cross-legged  on 
a  bunk,  engaged  in  mending  a  spur  strap,  was  the 
first  to  answer  his  inquiry  for  the  foreman. 

"  Billie  Warren  is  the  big  he-coon  of  the  Three 
Bar,"  he  informed.  "  You'll  likely  find  the  boss 
at  the  blacksmith  shop."  The  lanky  one  grinned 
as  the  stranger  turned  back  through  the  litter  of 
log  outbuildings,  guided  by  the  hissing  squeak  of 
bellows  and  the  clang  of  a  sledge  on  hot  iron. 
Several  men  pressed  close  to  the  windows  in  an- 
ticipation of  viewing  the  newcomer's  surprise  at 
greeting  the  Three  Bar  boss.  But  the  man  did 
not  seem  surprised  when  a  young  girl  emerged 
from  the  open  door  of  the  shop  as  he  neared 
it. 

She  was  clad  in  a  gray  flannel  skirt  and  black 
Angora  chaps.  The  heavy  brown  hair  was  con- 
cealed beneath  the  broad  hat  that  was  pulled  low 
over  her  eyes  after  the  fashion  of  those  who  live 
much  in  the  open.  The  man  removed  his  hat  and 
stood  before  her. 

"Miss  Warren?"  he  inquired.  The  girl 
nodded  and  waited  for  him  to  state  his  purpose. 

"  What  are  the  chances  of  my  riding  for  the 
Three  Bar?  "  he  asked. 

"We're  full-handed,"  said  the  girl.  "I'm 
sorry." 

"  You'll  be  breaking  out  the  remuda  right  soon 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  13 

now,"  he  suggested.  "  I'm  real  handy  round  a 
breaking  corral." 

"  They're  all  handy  at  that,"  she  said.  Then 
she  noted  the  two  horses  before  the  bunk  house 
and  frowned.  Her  eyes  searched  the  stranger's 
face  and  found  no  fault  with  it;  she  liked  his  level 
gaze.  But  she  wondered  what  manner  of  man 
this  was  who  had  so  aimlessly  wandered  alone  for 
a  year  and  avoided  all  other  men. 

"  Since  you've  finally  decided  to  work,  how 
does  it  happen  that  you  choose  the  Three  Bar? " 
she  asked,  then  flushed  under  his  eyes  as  she  re- 
membered that  so  many  men  had  wished  to  ride 
for  her  brand  more  than  for  another,  their  reasons 
in  each  case  the  same. 

"  Because  the  Three  Bar  needs  a  man  that  has 
prowled  this  country  and  gathered  a  few  points 
about  what's  going  on,"  he  returned. 

"And  that  information  is  for  sale  to  any  brand 
that  hires  you!"  said  the  girl.  "Is  that  what 
you  mean?  " 

"  If  it  was,  there  would  be  nothing  wrong  with 
a  man's  schooling  himself  to  know  all  points  of  his 
job  before  he  asked  for  it,"  he  said.  "  But  it 
happens  that  wasn't  exactly  my  reason." 

A  shade  of  weariness  passed  over  her  face. 
During  the  two  years  that  her  father  had  been 
confined  to  the  house  after  being  caved  in  by  a 
horse  and  in  the  one  year  that  had  elapsed  since 
his  death  the  six  thousand  cows  that  had  worn  the 


14         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

Three  Bar  brand  on  the  range  had  decreased  by 
ahnost  half  under  her  management. 

"  I'll  put  you  on,"  she  said.  "  But  you'll  prob- 
ably be  insulted  at  what  I  have  to  offer.  The 
men  start  out  after  the  horses  to-morrow.  I 
want  a  man  to  stay  here  and  do  tinkering  jobs 
round  the  place  till  they  get  back." 

"  That'll  suit  me  as  well  as  any,"  he  accepted 
promptly.  "  I'm  a  great  little  hand  at  tinkering 
round." 

The  clang  of  the  sledge  had  ceased  and  a  huge, 
fat  man  loomed  in  the  door  of  the  shop  and 
mopped  his  dripping  face  with  a  bandanna. 

"  I'm  glad  you've  come,"  he  assured  the  new- 
comer. "A  man  that's  not  above  doing  a  little 
fixing  up!  A  cowhand  is  the  most  overworked 
and  underpaid  saphead  that  ever  lost  three 
nights'  sleep  hand  running  and  worked  seventy- 
two  hours  on  end;  sleep  in  the  rain  or  not  at  all — 
to  hold  a  job  at  forty  per  for  six  months  in  the 
year.  The  other  six  he's  throwed  loose  like  a 
range  horse  to  rustle  or  starve.  Hardest  work  in 
the  world — but  he  don't  know  it,  or  money 
wouldn't  hire  him  to  lift  his  hand.  He  thinks  it's 
play.  Not  one  out  of  ten  but  what  prides  him- 
self that  he  can't  be  browbeat  into  doing  a  tap  of 
work.  Ask  him  to  cut  a  stick  of  firewood  and 
he'll  arch  his  back  and  laugh  at  you  scornful  like. 
Don't  that  beat  hell?" 

"  It  do,"  said  the  stranger. 


I 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  15 


I'm  the  best  wagon  cook  that  ever  sloshed 
dishwater  over  the  tail-gate,  and  even  better  than 
that  in  a  ranch-house  kitchen,"  the  loquacious 
one  modestly  assured  him.  "  But  I  can't  do  jus- 
tice to  the  meals  when  I  lay  out  to  do  all  the 
chores  within  four  miles  and  run  myself  thin  col- 
lecting scraps  and  squaw  wood  to  keep  the  stove 
het  up.  Now  since  Billie  has  hired  you,  I  trust 
you'll  work  up  a  pile  of  wood  that  will  keep  me 
going — and  folks  call  me  Waddles,"  he  added  as 
an  afterthought. 

"  Very  good,  Mr.  Waddles,"  the  newcomer 
smiled.    "  You  shall  have  your  fuel." 

The  big  man  grinned. 

"  That  title  is  derived  from  my  shape  and 
gait,"  he  informed.  "  My  regular  name  is  Smith 
— if  you're  set  on  tacking  a  Mister  on  behind  it." 

The  girl  waved  the  talkative  cook  aside  and 
turned  to  the  new  hand. 

"  You'll  take  it  then." 

He  nodded. 

"  Could  you  spare  me  about  ten  minutes  some 
time  to-day?  "  he  asked. 

"  Yes,"  she  said.  "  I'll  send  for  you  when  I 
have  time." 

The  man  headed  back  for  his  horses  and  un- 
lashed  the  buckskin's  top-pack,  dropping  it  to  the 
ground,  then  led  the  two  of  them  back  toward  the 
corral,  stripped  the  saddle  from  the  pinto,  the 
side  panniers  and  packsaddle  from  the  buckskin 


i6  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

and  turned  them  into  the  corral.  He  rambled 
among  the  outbuildings  on  a  tour  of  inspection 
and  the  girl  saw  him  stand  long  in  one  spot  before 
the  solid  log  cabin,  now  used  as  a  storeroom  for 
odds  and  ends,  that  had  been  the  first  one  erected 
on  the  Three  Bar  and  had  sheltered  the  Harrises 
before  her  father  took  over  their  brand. 


ir 

The  Three  Bar  girl  sat  looking  from  the 
window  of  her  own  room,  the  living  room  of  the 
ranch  house,  one  end  of  which  was  curtained  off 
to  serve  as  sleeping  quarters.  The  rattle  of  pots 
and  pans  came  from  the  big  room  in  the  rear 
which  was  used  by  Waddles  as  a  kitchen  and  din- 
ing hall  for  the  hands.  The  new  man  was  still 
prowling  about  the  place,  inspecting  every  detail, 
and  she  wondered  if  he  could  tell  her  anything 
which  would  prove  of  benefit  in  her  fight  to  stop 
the  shrinkage  of  the  Three  Bar  herds  and  help 
her  to  face  the  drastic  changes  that  were  reshap- 
ing the  policies  of  the  range  country. 

The  Three  Bar  home  range  was  one  of  many 
similar  isolated  spots  where  the  inhabitants  held 
out  for  a  continuance  of  the  old  order  of  things. 
All  through  the  West,  from  the  Mexican  border 
to  the  Canadian  line,  a  score  of  bitter  feuds  were 
in  progress,  the  principles  involved  differing 
widely  according  to  conditions  and  locality. 
There  were  existing  laws, — and  certain  clans  that 
denied  the  justice  of  each  one,  holding  out 
against  its  enforcement  and  making  laws  of  their 
own.     In  some  spots  the  paramount  issue  was 


i8  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

over  the  relative  grazing  rights  of  cows  and 
sheep,  fanning  a  flame  of  hatred  between  those 
whose  occupations  were  in  any  way  concerned 
with  these  rival  interests.  In  others  the  stock- 
men ignored  the  homestead  laws  which  pro- 
claimed that  settlers  could  file  their  rights  on 
land.  As  always  before,  wherever  men  resorted 
to  lawlessness  to  protect  their  fancied  rights,  the 
established  order  of  things  had  broken  down,  all 
laws  disregarded  instead  of  the  single  one  orig- 
inally involved. 

In  many  communities  these  clashes  between 
rival  interests  had  furnished  opportunity  for 
rustlers  to  build  up  in  power  and  practically  take 
the  range.  Each  clan  was  outside  the  law  in 
some  one  particular  and  so  could  not  have  re- 
course to  it  against  those  who  violated  it  in  some 
other  respect;  could  not  appear  against  neigh- 
bors in  one  matter  lest  their  friends  do  likewise 
against  themselves  in  another. 

This  attitude  had  enabled  the  wild  bunch  to 
saddle  themselves  on  certain  communities  and  ply 
their  trade  without  restraint.  Rustling  had  come 
to  be  a  recognized  occupation  to  be  reckoned 
with;  the  identity  of  the  thieves  was  often  known, 
and  they  visited  from  ranch  to  ranch,  whose  own- 
ers possibly  were  honest  themselves  but  had 
friends  among  the  outlaws  for  whom  the  latch- 
string  was  alwaj^s  out.  The  rustlers'  toll  was  in 
the  nature  of  a  tribute  levied  against  every  brand 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  19 

and  the  various  outfits  expected  certain  losses 
from  this  source.  It  was  good  business  to  recoup 
these  losses  at  another's  expense  and  thus  neigh- 
bor preyed  on  neighbor.  Big  outfits  fought  to 
crush  others  who  would  start  up  in  a  small  way, 
and  between  periods  of  defending  their  o^\tii  in- 
terests against  the  rustlers  they  hired  them  to 
harry  their  smaller  competitors  from  the  range; 
clover  for  outlaws  where  all  factions,  by  mutual 
assent,  played  their  own  hands  without  recourse 
to  the  law.  It  was  a  case  of  dog  eat  dog  and  the 
slogan  ran:  "  Catch  your  calves  in  a  basket  or 
some  other  thief  will  put  his  iron  on  them  first." 

It  was  to  this  pass  that  the  Three  Bar  home 
range  had  come  in  the  last  five  years.  As  Billie 
Warren  watched  the  new  hand  moving  slowly 
toward  the  bunk  house  she  pondered  over  what 
manner  of  man  this  could  be  who  had  played  a 
single-handed  game  in  the  hills  for  almost  a  year. 
Was  he  leagued  with  the  wild  bunch,  with  the 
law,  or  was  he  merely  an  eccentric  who  might 
have  some  special  knowledge  that  would  help  her 
save  the  Three  Bar  from  extinction? 

The  stranger  picked  up  his  bed  roll  and  dis- 
appeared through  the  bunk-house  door  as  she 
watched  him. 

The  lean  man  who  had  first  greeted  him  jerked 
a  thumb  toward  an  unoccupied  bunk. 

"  Pay  roll?  "  he  inquired;  then,  as  the  new  man 
nodded,   "  I'm   most  generally   referred   to   as 


20         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

Lanky,"  he  offered  tentatively.  "  Evans  is  the 
rest  of  it." 

The  stranger  hesitated  appreciably;  then: 

"  Harris  will  do  all  right  for  me — Cal  for 
every  day,"  he  returned  and  introductions  had 
been  effected.  It  was  up  to  each  man  to  use  his 
own  individual  method  of  making  his  name 
kno^^Ti  to  the  newcomer  as  occasion  arose. 

There  had  been  much  speculation  about  the 
brand  worn  by  the  two  horses.  The  hands  were 
a  drifting  lot,  gathered  from  almost  as  many 
points  as  there  were  men  present,  but  none  of 
them  Imew  the  brand. 

A  dark,  thin-faced  man  with  a  slender  black 
mustache  was  the  first  to  voice  a  query,  not  from 
the  fact  that  his  curiosity  was  large — it  was  per- 
haps less  than  that  of  any  other  man  in  the  room 
— but  for  the  reason  that  he  chose  to  satisfy  it  at 
once.  Morrow's  personality  was  cold  and  bleak, 
inviting  no  close  friendships  or  intimacies;  un- 
communicative to  a  degree  that  had  impressed 
itself  on  his  companions  of  the  last  few  days  and 
they  looked  up,  mildly  surprised  at  his  abrupt 
interrogation. 

"  Box  L,"  he  commented.  "  Where  does  that 
brand  run? " 

"  Southwest  Kansas  and  Oklahoma,"  the 
stranger  answered. 

"  Squatter  country,"  Morrow  said.  "  Every 
third  section  under  fence." 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  21 

Harris  sat  looking  through  the  door  at  the 
valley  spread  out  below  and  after  a  moment  he 
answered  the  thrust  as  if  he  had  been  long  pre- 
pared for  it. 

"  Yes,"  he  said.  "  And  that's  what  all  range 
country  will  come  to  in  a  few  more  years;  farm 
what  they  can  and  graze  what  they  can't — and 
the  sooner  the  better  for  all  concerned."  He 
waved  an  arm  down  the  valley.  "  Good  alfalfa 
dirt  going  to  waste  down  there — overrun  with 
sage  and  only  growing  enough  grass  to  keep  ten 
cows  to  the  quarter.  If  that  was  ripped  up  and 
seeded  to  hay  it  would  grow  enough  to  winter 
five  thousand  head." 

This  remark  led  to  the  old  debate  that  was 
never-ending  in  the  cow  country,  breaking  out 
afresh  in  every  bunk  house  and  exhaustively  re- 
discussed.  There  were  men  there  who  had 
viewed  both  ends  of  the  game, — ^had  seen  the 
foremost  outfits  in  other  parts  tearing  up  the 
sage  and  putting  in  hay  for  winter  feed  and  had 
seen  that  this  way  was  good. 

Evans  regarded  Harris  curiously  as  he  delib- 
erately provoked  the  argument,  then  sat  back  and 
listened  to  the  various  ideas  of  the  others  as  the 
discussion  became  heated  and  general.  It  oc- 
curred to  Evans  that  Harris  was  classifying  the 
men  by  their  views,  and  when  the  argument 
lagged  the  lean  man  grinned  and  gave  it  fresh 
impetus. 


22         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  It's  a  settled  fact  that  the  outfits  that  have 
put  in  hay  are  better  off,"  he  said.  "  But  there's 
a  dozen  localities  like  this,  a  dozen  little  civil  wars 
going  on  right  now  where  the  inhabitants  are  so 
mulish  that  they  lay  their  ears  and  fight  their  own 
interests  by  upholding  a  flea-bit  prejudice  that 
was  good  for  twenty  years  ago  but  is  a  dead  issue 
to-day." 

"  And  why  is  it  dead  to-day? "  Morrow  de- 
manded.   "  And  not  as  good  as  it  always  was?  " 

"  Only  a  hundred  or  so  different  reasons," 
Evans  returned  indifferently.  "  Then  beef -tops 
brought  ten  dollars  a  head  and  they're  worth 
three  times  that  now;  then  you  bought  a  brand 
on  the  hoof,  come  as  they  run,  for  round  five  dol- 
lars straight  through,  exclusive  of  calves;  now 
it's  based  at  ten  on  the  round-up  tally.  In  those 
days  a  man  could  better  afford  to  let  part  of  his 
cows  winter-kill  than  to  raise  feed  to  winter  the 
whole  of  them  through — among  other  things. 
These  days  he  can't." 

"And  have  your  water  holes  fenced,"  Morrow 
said.  "  As  soon  as  you  let  the  first  squatter 
light." 

"  The  government  has  prohibited  fencing 
water  holes  necessary  to  the  adjacent  range," 
Harris  cut  in.  "  If  that  valley  was  mine  I'd 
have  put  it  in  hay  this  long  time  back." 

"  But  it  wasn't  yours,"  Morrow  pointed 
out. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         23 

"  No ;  but  it  is  now,  or  at  least  a  part  of  it  is," 
Harris  said.  "  I  picked  up  that  school  section 
that  lays  across  the  valley  and  filed  on  a  home 
quarter  that  butts  up  against  the  rims."  He  sat 
gazing  indifferently  out  the  door  as  if  imcon- 
scious  of  the  dead  silence  that  followed  his  re- 
mark. More  men  had  drifted  in  till  nearly  a 
dozen  were  gathered  in  the  room. 

"  That's  never  been  done  out  here — ^buying 
school  sections  and  filing  squatter's  rights,"  Mor- 
row said  at  last.  "  This  is  cow  country  and  will 
never  be  anything  else." 

"  Good  cow  country,"  Harris  agreed.  "And  it 
stands  to  reason  it  could  be  made  better  with  a 
little  help." 

"  Whenever  you  start  helping  a  country  witK 
fence  and  plow  you  ruin  it  for  cows,"  Morrow 
stated.    "I  know!" 

"  It  always  loomed  up  in  the  light  of  a  good 
move  to  me,"  the  newcomer  returned.  "  One  of 
us  has  likely  read  his  signs  wrong." 

"  There's  some  signs  round  here  you  better 
read,"  Morrow  said.  "  They  were  posted  for 
such  as  you." 

"  It  appears  like  I'd  maybe  made  a  bad  selec- 
tion then.  I'm  sorry  about  that,"  Harris  dep- 
recated in  a  negligent  tone  that  belied  his  words. 
"  It's  hard  to  tell  just  how  it  will  pan  out." 

"  Not  so  very  hard — if  you  can  read,"  the  dark 
man  contradicted. 


24  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

The  newcomer's  gaze  returned  from  down  the 
valley  and  settled  on  Morrow's  face. 

"  Do  you  run  a  brand  of  your  own — so's  you'd 
stand  to  lose  a  dollar  if  every  foot  of  range  was 
fenced? "  he  inquired. 

"  What  are  you  trying  to  get  at  now?  "  Mor- 
row demanded. 

"Nothing  much — ^now;  I've  already  got," 
Harris  said.  "  A  man's  interest  lays  on  the  side 
where  his  finances  are  most  concerned." 

"What  do  you  mean  by  that?"  Morrow  in- 
sisted. 

"  You're  good  at  predicting — ^maybe  you're 
an  expert  at  guessing  too,"  Harris  returned. 
And  suddenly  Evans  laughed  as  if  something 
had  just  occurred  to  him. 

Morrow  glanced  at  him  without  turning  his 
head,  then  fell  silent,  his  expression  unchanged. 

A  chunky  youngster  stood  in  the  door  and 
bent  an  approving  gaze  on  the  big  pinto  as  he 
swung  out  across  the  pasture  lot.  The  boy's  face 
was  small  and  quizzical,  a  shaggy  mop  of  tawny 
hair  hanging  so  low  upon  his  forehead  that  his 
mild  blue  eyes  peered  forth  from  under  the  fringe 
of  it  and  gave  him  the  air  of  a  surprised  terrier, 
which  effect  had  gained  him  the  title  of  Bangs. 

"  I  bet  the  little  paint-horse  could  make  a  man 
swing  and  rattle  to  set  up  in  his  middle,  once  he 
started  to  act  up,"  he  said. 

"  Calico  wouldn't  know  how  to  start,"  Harris 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  25 

said.  "  A  horse,  inside  his  limitations,  is  what  his 
breaker  makes  him.  I  never  favored  the  idea  of 
breaking  a  horse  to  fight  you  every  time  you 
climb  him.    My  horses  are  gentle-broke." 

"  But  you  have  to  be  able  to  top  off  just  any 
kind  of  a  horse,"  Bangs  objected. 

That  don't  hinder  a  man  from  gentling  his 
own  string,"  Harris  returned. 

Bangs  turned  his  surprised  eyes  on  Harris  and 
regarded  him  intently  as  if  striving  to  fathom  a 
viewpoint  that  was  entirely  new  to  him. 
|p  "  Why,  it  don't,  for  a  fact,"  he  said  at  last. 
"  Only  I  just  never  happened  to  think  of  it  like 
that  before." 

Morrow  laughed  and  the  boy  flushed  at  the 
disagreeable  ring  of  it.  The  sound  was  not  loud 
but  flat  and  mirthless,  the  syllables  distinct  and 
evenly  spaced.  His  white  even  teeth  remained 
tight-closed  and  showed  in  flashing  contrast  to  his 
s^v^arthy  face  and  black  mustache.  Morrow's 
face  wore  none  of  the  active  malignancy  that 
stamps  the  features  of  those  uncontrolled  desper- 
adoes who  kill  in  a  flare  of  passion;  rather  it 
seemed  that  the  urge  to  kill  was  always  with  him, 
had  been  born  with  him,  his  face  drawn  and  over- 
lengthened  from  the  inner  effort  to  render  his 
homicidal  tendencies  submissive  to  his  brain,  not 
through  desire  for  regeneration,  for  he  had  none, 
but  as  a  mere  matter  of  expediency.  The  set, 
bleak  expression  of  countenance  was  but  a  reflec- 


26         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

tion  of  his  personality  and  his  companions  had 
sensed  this  strained  quality  without  being  able  to 
define  it  in  words. 

"  You  listen  to  what  the  squatter  man  tells 
you/'  Morrow  said  to  Bangs.  "  He'll  put  you 
right — give  you  a  course  in  how  everything  ought 
to  be  done."    He  rose  and  went  outside. 

"  That  was  a  real  unhumorous  laugh,"  Evans 
said.     "  Right  from  the  bottom  of  his  heart." 

A  raucous  bellow  soimded  from  the  cookhouse 
and  every  man  within  earshot  rose  and  moved 
toward  the  summons  to  feed. 

"  Let's  go  eat  it  up,"  Evans  said  and  left  the 
bunk  house  with  Harris. 

"  Did  you  gather  all  the  information  you  was 
prospecting  for?  "  he  asked. 

Harris  nodded.  "  I  sorted  out  one  man's  num- 
ber," he  said. 

"  Now  if  you'd  only  whispered  to  me  I'd  have 
told  you  right  off,"  Evans  said.  "  It's  astonish- 
ing how  easy  it  is  to  pick  them  if  you  try." 

"  Waddles  is  a  right  unpresuming  sort  of  a 
man  in  most  respects,"  Evans  volunteered  as  they 
entered  the  cookhouse.  "  But  he's  downright 
egotistical  about  his  culinary  accomplish- 
ments." 

All  through  the  meal  the  gigantic  cook  hovered 
near  Billie  Warren  as  she  sat  near  one  end  of  the 
long  table.  It  was  evident  to  Harris  that  the  big 
man  was  self-appointed  guardian  and  counsellor 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  27 

of  the  Three  Bar  boss.  He  showed  the  same 
fussy  solicitude  for  her  welfare  that  a  hen  would 
show  for  her  helpless  chicks. 

"  Praise  the  grub  and  have  a  friend  at  feourt," 
Harris  murmured  in  Evans'  ear. 

Billie  Warren  had  nearly  completed  her  meal 
before  the  men  came  in.  She  left  the  table  and 
went  to  her  own  room.  ^Vlien  Harris  rose  to  go 
he  slapped  the  big  man  on  the  back. 

"  I'd  work  for  half  pay  where  you  get  grub 
like  this,"  he  said.  "  That's  what  I'd  call  a  real 
feed." 

Waddles  beamed  and  followed  him  to  the  door. 

"  It's  a  fact  that  I  can  set  out  the  best  bait  you 
ever  throwed  a  lip  over,"  he  confessed.  "  You're 
a  man  of  excellent  tastes  and  it's  a  real  pleasure 
to  have  you  about." 

Billie  Warren  opened  the  door  and  motioned 
to  Harris.  He  went  into  the  big  front  room  that 
answered  for  both  living  room  and  sleeping 
quarters.  A  fire  burned  in  the  rough  stone  fire- 
place; tanned  pelts,  Indian  curios  and  Navajo 
rugs  covered  the  walls;  more  rugs  and  pelts  lay 
on  the  floor.  Indian  blankets  partitioned  off  one 
end  for  her  sleeping  room. 

"  You  had  something  to  tell  me,"  she  observed, 
after  he  had  remained  silent  for  the  space  of  a 
minute,  sitting  in  the  chair  she  had  indicated  and 
gazing  into  the  fire. 

"And  I'll  have  to  start  it  a  little  different  from 


28         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

the  way  I  first  counted  on,"  he  said.  "  Have  any 
of  the  boys  mentioned  my  name  to  you?  " 

She  shook  her  head  and  waited  for  him  to  go 
on. 

"  You  won't  care  much  to  hear  it,"  he  an- 
nounced. "  I'd  thought  some  of  spending  two 
years  here  under  some  other  name — but  perhaps 
it's  better  to  come  out  in  the  open — don't  you 
think? " 

The  girl  had  straightened  in  her  chair  and  was 
leaning  toward  him,  her  face  white  and  her  gray 
eyes  boring  straight  into  the  man's.  She  knew 
now  who  he  was, — the  man  she  had  more  reason 
to  despise  than  all  others  on  earth  combined.  Of 
the  Harris  family  she  knew  nothing  at  all  except 
that  her  father's  lifelong  regret  had  been  the  fact 
that  the  partnership  between  himself  and  his  old- 
est friend,  William  Harris,  had  never  been 
brought  to  pass.  And  this  regret  had,  in  the  end, 
led  him  to  try  and  cement  that  arrangement  in 
the  second  generation.  Five  years  before  his  trail 
had  crossed  that  of  the  elder  Harris  for  the  first 
time  since  he  had  taken  over  the  Three  Bar 
brand;  and  when  his  will  had  been  read  she  had 
known  that  on  the  occasion  of  that  visit  his  old 
friend  had  played  upon  this  sentiment  to  trick 
him  into  making  it.  On  all  sides  of  her  she  had 
evidence  that  men  were  wolves  who  preyed  upon 
ihe  interests  of  others,  and  there  was  not  a  doubt 
Ubat  the  father  of  the  man  before  her  had  preyed 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  29 

upon  her  interests  through  the  sentiment  of  her 
parent;  no  other  possible  theory  could  account 
for  the  strange  disposal  of  his  property,  the  will 
dated  and  signed  at  the  exact  time  of  his  visit  to 
the  Harrises. 

The  tenseness  of  her  pose  was  replaced  by 
lethargic  indifference  and  she  relaxed  into  her 
chair. 

"  I've  known  all  the  time  you  would  come,"  she 
said. 

"  It's  too  bad,  Billie,"  he  said.  "  It's  tough 
having  me  wished  on  to  you  this  way." 

"  Don't  play  that  game  with  me! "  she  flared. 
*'  Of  course  you've  disproved  every  drop  of  hu- 
man decency  in  advance." 

"  It  sure  looms  up  like  that  on  the  surface," 
he  admitted  ruefully.  "  But  I  didn't  have  a  hand 
in  cinching  you  this  way." 

"  You  could  have  proved  that  by  staying  away. 
I  wrote  you  a  year  ago  that  I'd  donate  you  a 
half-interest  in  the  Three  Bar  at  the  expiration 
of  the  time  if  you'd  only  keep  off  the  place.  But 
at  the  last  moment  you  couldn't  resist  having  it 
all.  Ten  more  days  and  you'd  have  been  too 
late." 

The  man  nodded  slowly. 

"  Too  late,"  he  agreed  and  sat  looking  into  the 
fire. 

She  had  been  almost  a  son  to  her  father,  had 
ridden  the  range  with  him,  managed  the  Three 


30  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

Bar  during  his  sickness ;  and  such  was  her  loyalty 
to  his  memory  that  not  a  trace  of  her  bitterness 
had  been  directed  toward  her  parent.  He  had 
loved  the  Three  Bar  and  had  always  believed  that 
old  Bill  Harris,  its  founder,  had  loved  it  too.  His 
will  had  stipulated  that  half  of  his  property 
should  go  to  the  younger  Harris  under  the  condi- 
tion that  the  man  should  make  his  home  on  the 
Three  Bar  for  two  out  of  the  first  three  years 
after  her  father's  decease.  The  whole  of  it  was 
to  go  to  him  in  case  she  failed  to  make  her  own 
home  at  the  Three  Bar  during  her  co-heir's  stay, 
or  in  the  event  of  her  marriage  to  another  before 
the  expiration  of  three  years. 

"  Of  course  I'm  tied  here  for  two  years,"  she 
said.  "  Or  left  penniless.  If  you  can  make  it  un- 
pleasant enough  to  drive  me  away — which  won't 
be  difficult — ^you  win." 

"  I  wouldn't  count  too  strong  on  that,"  he 
counseled  mildly. 

"  Then  why  did  you  come? "  she  insisted. 
'*  Half  of  it  was  yours  by  merely  keeping  away." 

"  Maybe  I'm  sort  of  tied  up  myself — in  ways 
you  don't  suspect,"  he  offered. 

"  Very  likely!  "  she  returned;  "  sounds  plausi- 
ble. You  might  offer  to  marry  me,"  she  sug- 
gested when  he  failed  to  answer.  "  You  could 
gain  full  possession  at  once  that  way." 

He  removed  his  gaze  from  the  fire  and  looked 
long  at  her. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  31 

"  It  will  likely  come  to  that,"  he  said. 

"I'll  put  a  weapon  in  your  hands,"  she  re- 
torted. "  Whenever  it  does  come  to  that  I'll 
leave  the  ranch — ^so  now  you  know  the  one  sure 
way  to  win." 

"  I  hope  it  won't  pan  out  like  that,"  he  said. 
*'  I'll  be  disappointed — more  than  I  can  say." 

She  rose  and  stood  waiting  for  him  to  go. 

"  Good  night,  Billie,"  he  said.  "  I  expect 
maybe  things  will  break  all  right  for  us." 

She  did  not  answer  and  he  went  out.  Waddles 
hailed  him  in  friendly  fashion  as  he  passed 
through  the  cookhouse,  then  wiped  his  hands  and 
stepped  into  Billie's  quarters.  Waddles  was  a 
fixture  at  the  Three  Bar;  he  had  ridden  for  her 
father  until  he  had  his  legs  smashed  up  by  a  horse 
and  had  thereafter  reigned  as  cook.  He  was  con- 
fidential adviser  and  self-appointed  guardian  of 
the  girl.  His  mind  was  still  pleasantly  concerned 
with  the  stranger's  warm  praise  of  his  culinary 
efforts. 

"  That  new  man  now,  Billie,"  he  remarked. 
*'  He's  away  off  ahead  of  the  average  run.  You 
mark  me — he'll  be  top  hand  with  this  outfit  in  no 
time  at  all."  Then  he  observed  the  girl's  expres- 
sion. **  What  is  it.  Pet?  "  he  inquired.  "What's 
a-f retting  you?  " 

"  Do  you  know  who  he  is?  "  she  asked. 

Waddles  wagged  a  negative  head. 

"  He's  Calvin  Harris,"  she  stated. 


32  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

Instead  of  the  blank  dismay  which  she  had  ex- 
pected to  see  depicted  on  Waddles' s  face  at  this 
announcement,  it  seemed  to  her  that  the  big  man 
was  pleased. 

"  The  hell!  "  he  said.  "  'Sense  me,  Billie.  So 
this  here  is  Cal!  Well,  well — ^now  what  do  you 
think  of  that? " 

"  I  think  that  I  don't  want  to  stay  here  alone 
with  him  while  you're  out  after  the  horses,"  she 
returned. 

"Wrong  idea!"  the  big  man  promptly  con- 
tradicted. "  You've  got  to  stick  it  out  for  two 
years,  girl.  The  best  thing  you  can  do  is  to  get 
acquainted;  and  figure  out  how  to  get  along  the 
best  you  can — the  pair  of  you." 

"  That's  probably  true,"  she  assented  indif- 
ferently. "  I'll  have  to  face  a  number  of  things 
that  are  equally  unpleasant  in  the  next  two  years 
— so  I  might  as  well  start  now.  He  must  have 
praised  the  food  in  order  to  win  you  to  his  side 
in  two  minutes  flat." 

Waddles's  face  expressed  pained  reproach. 

"  Now  there  it  is  again !  "  he  said.  "  You  know 
I'm  only  on  one  side — yours.  Old  Cal  Warren 
had  some  definite  notion  when  he  framed  this 
play ;  so  it's  likely  this  young  Cal  is  on  your  side, 
too}' 

"  But  even  more  likely  not,"  she  stated. 
"Then  what?" 

"  Why,  then  I'll  have  to  kill  him  and  put  a 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         33 

stop  to  it,"  the  big  man  announced.  "  But  it's 
noways  probable  that  it  will  come  to  that.  Let's 
use  logic.  He  spoke  well  of  my  cooking — like 
j^ou  said — which  proves  him  a  man  of  some  dis- 
cernment. No  way  to  get  around  that.  Now  a 
man  with  his  judgment  wouldn't  suspect  for  one 
living  second  that  he  could  play  it  low-down  on 
you  with  me  roosting  close  at  hand.  Putting  two 
])lain  facts  together  it  works  out  right  natural 
and  simple  that  he's  on  the  square.  As  easy  as 
ihat,"  he  finished  triumphantly.  "  So  don't  you 
fret.  And  in  case  he  acts  up  I'll  clamp  down  on 
him  real  sudden,"  he  added  by  way  of  further 
reassurance. 

His  gi'eat  paw  opened  and  shut  to  illustrate  his 
point  as  he  moved  toward  the  door  and  the  Three 
Bar  girl  knew  that  when  Waddles  spoke  of 
clamping  down  it  was  no  mere  figure  of  speech. 


Ill 

BiLLiE  Waeeen  heard  the  steady  buzz  of  a 
saw  and  later  the  ringing  strokes  of  an  axe.  The 
men  had  departed  three  hours  before  to  be  gone 
for  a  week  on  the  horse  round-up  but  she  had  not 
yet  issued  from  her  own  quarters.  The  music  of 
axe  and  saw  was  ample  evidence  that  her  new  and 
undesired  partner  was  making  valuable  use  of  his 
time.  She  went  outside  and  he  struck  the  axe  in 
a  cross  section  of  pine  log  as  she  moved  toward 
him. 

"  We'll  have  to  get  along  the  best  we  can,"  she 
announced  abruptly.  "  Of  course  you  will  have 
a  say  in  the  management  of  the  Three  Bar  and 
draw  the  same  amount  for  yourself  that  I  do." 

He  sat  on  a  log  and  twisted  a  cigarette  as  he 
reflected  upon  this  statement. 

"  I'd  rather  not  do  that,"  he  decided.  "  I  don't 
want  to  be  a  drain  on  the  brand — but  to  help 
build  it  up.  Suppose  I  just  serve  as  an  extra 
hand  and  do  whatever  necessary  turns  up — in  re- 
turn for  your  letting  me  advise  with  you  on  a  few 
points  that  I  happen  to  have  worked  out  while  I 
was  prowling  through  the  country." 

"  Any  way  you  like,"  she  returned.  "  It's  for 
you  to  decide.     Any  money  which  you  fail  to 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         35 

draw  now  will  revert  to  you  in  the  end  so  it  won't 
matter  in  the  least." 

His  reply  was  irrelevant,  a  deliberate  refusal 
to  notice  her  ungenerous  misinterpretation  of  his 
offer. 

"  Do  you  mind  if  I  gather  a  few  Three  Bar 
colts  round  here  close  and  break  out  my  own 
string  before  they  get  back?  "  he  asked. 

"  Anything  you  like,"  she  repeated.  "  I'm  not 
going  to  quarrel.  I've  made  up  my  mind  to  that. 
I'll  be  gone  the  rest  of  the  day." 

Five  minutes  later  he  saw  her  riding  down  the 
lane.  She  was  not  seeking  companionship  but 
rather  solitude  and  for  hours  she  drifted  aim- 
lessly across  the  range,  sometimes  dismounting 
on  some  point  that  afforded  a  good  view  and  re- 
clining in  the  warm  spring  sun.  Dusk  was  fall- 
ing when  she  rode  back  to  the  Three  Bar.  As 
she  turned  her  sorrel.  Papoose,  into  the  corral 
she  noticed  several  four-year-old  colts  in  the  pas- 
ture lot.  As  she  returned  to  the  house  Harris 
appeared  in  the  door. 

"  Grub-pile,"  he  announced. 

They  sat  down  to  a  meal  of  broiled  steak, 
mashed  potatoes,  hot  biscuits,  coffee  and  rasp- 
berry jam.  She  had  deliberately  absented  her- 
self through  the  noon  hour  and  well  past  the  time 
for  evening  meal,  confidently  expecting  to  find 
him  impatiently  waiting  for  her  to  return  and 
prepare  food  for  him. 


36         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  You  make  good  biscuits — better  than  those 
Waddles  stirs  up,"  she  said.  "  Though  I'd  never 
dare  tell  him  so."  It  was  the  first  time  she  had 
conceded  that  there  might  be  even  a  taint  of  good 
in  him. 

"  Well,  yes — they're  some  better  than  those  I 
usually  turn  out,"  he  confessed.  "  Having  a  lady 
to  feed  I  flaked  the  lard  in  cold  instead  of  just 
melting  it  and  stirring  her  in  like  I  most  gener- 
ally do.  I'm  right  glad  that  you  consider  them 
a  success." 

When  the  meal  vi^as  finished  she  rose  without 
a  word  and  went  into  her  own  quarters,  convinced 
that  this  desertion  would  certainly  call  forth  a 
protest ;  but  the  man  calmly  went  about  the  busi- 
ness of  washing  the  dishes  as  if  he  had  expected 
nothing  else,  and  presently  she  heard  the  door 
close  behind  him  and  immediately  afterwards  a 
light  appeared  in  the  bunk-house  window. 

The  rattle  of  pots  and  pans  roused  her  before 
daylight.  Some  thirty  minutes  later  he  called  to 
her. 

"  I've  finished,"  he  said.  "  You'd  better  eat 
yours  before  it  gets  cold,"  and  the  closing  of  the 
door  announced  that  he  had  gone  without  waiting 
for  an  answer.  She  heard  again  the  sound  of  saw 
and  axe  as  he  worked  up  the  dry  logs  into  stove 
lengths.  At  least  he  was  making  good  his  word 
to  the  cook.  The  sounds  ceased  when  the  sun 
was  an  hour  high  and  when  she  looked  out  to 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         37 

determine  the  reason  she  saw  him  working  with 
four  colts  in  one  of  the  smaller  corrals. 

He  had  fashioned  a  hackamore  for  each  and 
they  stood  tied  to  the  corral  bars.  He  left  them 
there  and  repaired  to  the  big  gates  of  the  main 
corral.  The  two  swinging  halves  sagged  until 
their  ends  dragged  on  the  ground  when  opened  or 
closed,  necessitating  the  expenditure  of  consider- 
able energy  in  performing  either  operation.  She 
Avatched  him  tear  down  the  old  support  wires  and 
replace  them  with  new  ones,  stretching  a  double 
strand  from  the  top  of  the  tall  pivot  posts  to  the 
free  ends  of  the  gates.  Placing  a  short  stick  be- 
tween the  two  strands  of  heavy  wire  he  twisted 
imtil  the  shortening  process  had  cleared  the  gate 
ends  and  they  swung  suspended,  moving  so  freely 
that  a  rider  could  lean  from  his  saddle  and  throw 
them  open  with  ease. 

This  completed  to  his  satisfaction  he  fashioned 
heavy  slabs  of  wood  to  serve  as  extra  brake- 
blocks  for  the  chuck  wagon.  Between  the  per- 
formance of  each  two  self-appointed  duties  he 
spent  some  little  time  with  the  colts,  handling 
them  and  teaching  them  not  to  fear  his  approach, 
cinching  his  saddle  on  first  one  and  then  the  next, 
talking  to  them  and  handling  their  heads. 

For  three  days  there  was  little  communication 
between  the  two.  It  was  evident  that  he  had  no 
intention  of  forcing  his  society  upon  her,  and  her 
failure  to  prepare  his  meals  failed  to  elicit  a  single 


38         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

sign  to  show  that  he  had  expected  otherwise ;  the 
contrary  was  true,  in  fact,  for  he  invariably  pre- 
pared enough  for  two.  It  was  clear  that  he 
exercised  the  same  patience  toward  her  that  he 
showed  in  handling  the  gTcen  four-year-olds ;  and 
she  was  inclined  to  be  a  little  scornful  of  his 
method  of  gentle-breaking  them.  She  felt  her 
OAvn  ability  to  handle  any  horse  on  the  range  al- 
though old  Cal  Warren  had  gentled  every  animal 
she  had  wanted  for  her  own  and  flatly  refused  to 
let  her  mount  any  others.  Waddles  was  as  in- 
sistent upon  this  point  as  her  parent  had  been, 
but  never  had  she  known  a  cowhand  who  took 
time  and  pains  to  gentle  his  own  string. 

In  the  afternoon  of  the  third  day  she  saw  him 
swing  to  the  back  of  a  big  bay,  easing  into  the 
saddle  without  a  jar,  and  the  colt  ambled  round 
the  corral,  rolling  his  eyes  back  toward  the  thing 
clamped  upon  him  but  making  no  effort  to  pitch. 
He  dismounted  and  stripped  off  the  saddle, 
cinched  it  on  a  second  horse  and  let  him  stand, 
leading  a  third  out  to  a  snubbing  post  near  the 
door  of  the  blacksmith  shop  where  he  proceeded 
to  put  on  his  first  set  of  shoes. 

The  girl  went  out  and  sat  on  the  sill  of  the 
shop  door  and  watched  him.  The  colt  pulled 
back  in  an  effort  to  release  the  forefoot  that  the 
man  held  clamped  between  his  leather-clad  knees, 
then  changed  his  tactics  and  sagged  his  weight 
against  Harris. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         39 

"  You  Babe !  "  the  man  ordered.  "  Don't  you 
go  leaning  on  me."  He  pared  down  the  hoof 
and  fitted  the  shoe  but  before  nailing  it  on  he  re- 
leased the  colt's  foot  and  addressed  the  girl.  "  If 
I'd  fight  him  now  while  he's  spooky  and  half- 
scared  it  would  spoil  him  maybe,"  he  explained. 

"  I  gentle-break  mine,  too,"  she  said,  and  the 
man  overlooked  the  inflection  which,  as  plainly 
as  words,  was  intended  to  convey  the  impression 
tliat  his  ways  were  effeminate.  "  If  every  man 
used  up  his  time  gentling  his  string  he'd  never 
have  a  day  off  to  work  at  anything  else." 

"Why,  it  don't  use  up  much  time,"  he  ob- 
jected. "  They  halfway  break  themselves,  stand- 
ing round  with  a  saddle  on  and  having  a  man 
handle  them  a  little  between  spells  of  regular 
work — ^like  cutting  firewood  and  such.  And 
it's  a  saving  of  time  in  the  end.  There's  three 
hundred  odd  days  every  year  when  a  man  con- 
sumes considerable  time  fighting  every  horse  he 
steps  up  on — if  they're  broke  that  way  to  start." 

"  So  your  only  reason  for  not  riding  them  out 
is  to  save  time,"  she  said. 

"  If  you  mean  that  I'm  timid,"  he  observed, 
"  why,  I  don't  know  as  I'd  bother  to  dis- 
pute it."  He  moved  over  and  sat  on  his  heels 
facing  her,  twisting  the  ever  handy  cigarette. 
"  Listen,"  he  urged.  "  Let's  you  and  I  try  to  get 
along.  Now  if  you'll  only  make  up  your  mind 
that  I'm  not  out  to  grab  the  Three  Bar,  not  even 


40  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

the  half  of  it  that's  supposed  to  be  mine — unless 
you  get  paid  for  it — why,  we're  liable  to  get  to 
liking  each  other  real  well  in  the  end.  I'll  give 
you  a  contract  to  that  effect." 

"  Which  you  know  would  be  worthless! "  she 
returned.  "  The  will  specifically  states  that  any 
agreements  between  us  prior  to  the  time  of  di- 
vision are  to  be  disregarded.  A  written  contract 
would  have  no  more  value  than  your  unsupj)orted 
promise  and  in  view  of  what's  happened  you 
don't  expect  me  to  place  a  value  on  that." 

He  pulled  reflectively  at  his  cigarette  and  she 
rather  expected  another  of  the  irrelevant  remarks 
with  which  he  so  often  replied  to  her  pointed 
thrusts. 

"  No,"  he  said  at  last.  "  But  it's  a  fact  that  I 
don't  want  the  Three  Bar — or  rather  I  do  if  you 
should  ever  decide  to  sell." 

"  I  never  will,"  she  stated  positively.  "  It's 
always  been  my  home.  I've  been  away  and  had 
a  good  time;  three  winters  in  school  and  enjoying 
every  second;  but  there  always  comes  a  time  when 
I'm  sick  to  get  back,  when  I  know  I  can't  stay 
away  from  the  Three  Bar,  when  I  want  to  smell 
the  sage  and  throw  my  leg  across  a  horse — and 
ride!" 

"I  know,  Billie,"  he  said  softly.  "I  was 
raised  here,  up  until  I  was  eight.  My  feeling  is 
likely  less  acute  than  yours  but  I've  always 
hankered  to  get  back  to  where  the  sage  and  pine 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  41 

trees  run  together.  I  mentioned  a  while  back  that 
I  was  tied  up  peculiar  and  stood  to  lose  consider- 
able if  I  failed  to  put  in  two  years  out  here — 
which  wouldn't  have  been  of  any  particular  con- 
sequence only  that  I  found  out  that  the  Three 
I^ar  was  going  under  unless  some  one  put  a  stop 
to  what's  going  on.  I'll  pull  it  out  of  the  hole, 
maybe,  and  hand  it  back  to  you." 

She  was  swayed  into  a  momentary  belief  in  his 
sincerity  but  steeled  herself  against  it,  and  in  the 
effort  to  strengthen  the  crumbling  walls  of  her 
dislike  she  fell  back  on  open  ridicule. 

"  You!  "  she  flared.  "  And  what  can  you  do 
against  it — a  man  that  was  raised  in  squatter 
country  behind  a  barb-wire  fence,  who  has  to 
gentle  his  horses  before  he  can  sit  up  on  one,  who 
has  hitched  a  gun  on  his  belt  because  he  thinks  it's 
the  thing  to  do,  and  has  stowed  it  in  a  place  where 
he'd  have  to  tie  himself  in  a  knot — or  undress — 
to  reach  it.  And  then  you  talk  of  pulling  the 
Three  Bar  out  of  a  hole !  Why,  there  are  twenty 
men  within  fifty  miles  of  here  that  would  kill  you 
the  first  move  you  made." 

"  There's  considerable  sound  truth  in  that,"  he 
said.  He  looked  down  at  his  gun ;  it  swung  on  his 
left  side,  in  front,  the  butt  pointing  toward  the 
right.  "  It's  easier  to  work  with  it  sort  of  out  of 
the  way  of  my  hands,"  he  explained  and  smiled. 

She  found  herself  liking  him,  even  in  the  face 
of  the  treachery  he  had  practiced  against  her  fa- 


42  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

ther  and  was  correspondingly  angry,  both  with 
herself  and  at  him.  She  left  him  without  a  word 
and  returned  to  the  house. 

He  finished  putting  the  shoes  on  the  colt  and 
as  he  turned  him  back  into  the  corral  he  observed 
a  horseman  jogging  up  the  lane  at  a  trail  trot. 
He  knew  the  man  for  Slade,  whose  home  ranch 
lay  forty  miles  to  the  south  and  a  little  west,  the 
owner  of  the  largest  outfit  in  that  end  of  the 
State;  a  man  feared  by  his  competitors,  quick  to 
resent  an  insinuation  against  his  business 
methods  and  capable  of  backing  his  resentment. 

Slade  dropped  from  his  horse  and  accorded 
Harris  only  a  casual  nod  as  he  headed  for  the 
house.  Slade's  face  was  of  a  peculiar  cast.  The 
black  eyes  were  set  very  close  together  in  a  wide 
face ;  his  cheek  bones  were  low  and  oddly  protrud- 
ing, sloping  far  out  to  a  point  below  each  eye.  His 
small  ears  were  set  so  close  to  his  skull  that  the 
outcropping  cheek  bones  extended  almost  an  inch 
beyond  them  to  either  side.  Yet  there  was  a  cer- 
tain fascination  about  his  face  and  bearing  that 
appealed  to  the  spark  of  the  primitive  in  women; 
that  last  lingering  cell  that  harks  fondly  back  to 
men  in  the  raw.  His  age  might  have  been  any- 
where above  twenty-six  and  under  fifty-six. 

He  walked  through  the  cookhouse  and  opened 
the  door  of  the  girl's  quarters  without  the  for- 
mality of  a  knock,  as  if  a  frequent  visitor  and 
sure  of  his  privileges. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  43 

"  How  many  times  have  I  told  you  to  knock?  " 
she  demanded.  "  The  next  tune  you  forget  it  I'll 
go  out  as  you  come  in." 

Slade  dropped  into  a  chair. 

"  I  never  have  knocked — ^not  in  twelve  years," 
he  said. 

"  It  was  somewhat  different  when  I  was  a 
small  girl  and  you  were  only  a  friend  of  my  fa- 
ther," she  pointed  out.    "  But  now " 

"  But  now  that  I've  come  to  see  you  as  a 
woman  it's  different?  "  he  inquired.  "  No  reason 
for  that." 

She  switched  the  channel  of  conversation  and 
spoke  of  the  coming  round-up,  of  the  poor  con- 
dition of  range  stock  owing  to  the  severity  of  the 
winter;  but  it  was  a  monologue.  For  a  time  the 
man  sat  and  listened,  as  if  he  enjoyed  the  sound 
of  her  voice,  contributing  nothing  to  the  conver- 
sation himself,  then  suddenly  he  stirred  in  his 
chair  and  waved  a  hand  to  indicate  the  unim- 
portance of  the  topics. 

"  Yes,  yes ;  true  enough,"  he  interrupted. 
*'  But  I  didn't  come  to  talk  about  that.  When 
are  you  coming  home  with  me,  Billie?  " 

"  And  you  can't  come  if  you  insist  on  talking 
about  that,"  she  countered. 

"  I'll  come,"  he  stated.  "  Tell  me  when  you're 
going  to  move  over  to  the  Circle  P." 

"  Not  ever,"  she  said.  "  I'd  rather  be  a  man  s 
horse  than  his  wife.    Men  treat  women  like  little 


44         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

tinsel  queens  before,  and  afterwards  they  answer 
to  save  a  cook's  wages  and  drudge  their  lives  out 
feeding  a  bunch  of  half -starved  hands — or  else 
go  to  the  other  extreme.  Wives  are  either  work 
horses  or  pets.  I  was  raised  like  a  boy  and  I  want 
to  have  a  say  in  running  things  myself." 

"  You  can  go  your  own  gait,"  he  pledged. 

"  I'm  doing  that  now,"  she  returned.  "  And 
prefer  going  on  as  I  am." 

Slade  rose  and  moved  over  to  her,  taking  her 
hands  and  lifting  her  from  her  chair. 

The  girl  pushed  him  back  with  a  hand  braced 
against  his  chest. 

"  Stop  it!  "  she  said.  "  You're  getting  wilder 
every  time  you  come,  but  you've  never  pawed  at 
me  before.  I  won't  have  people's  hands  on  me," 
and  she  made  a  grimace  of  distaste. 

The  man  reached  out  again  and  drew  her  to 
him.    She  wrenched  away  and  faced  Slade. 

"  That  will  be  the  last  time  you'll  do  that  until 
I  give  the  word,"  she  said.  "  I  don't  want  the 
Circle  P — or  you.  When  I  do  I'll  let  you 
laiow!" 

He  moved  toward  her  again  and  she  refused 
to  back  away  from  him  but  stood  with  her  hands 
at  her  sides. 

"  If  you  put  a  finger  on  me  it's  the  last  time 
you'll  visit  the  Three  Bar,"  she  calmly  an- 
nounced. 

He  stood  so  close  as  almost  to  touch  her  but  she 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         45 

failed  to  lift  a  hand  or  move  back  an  inch,  and 
Slade  laiew  that  he  faced  one  whose  spirit 
matched  his  own,  perhaps  the  one  person  within 
a  hundred  miles  who  did  not  fear  him.  He  had 
tamed  men  and  horses — and  women ;  he  raised  his 
arms  slowly,  deliberately,  to  see  if  she  would 
llinch  away  or  stand  fast  and  outgame  him.  She 
knew  that  he  was  harmless  to  her — and  he  knew 
it.  He  might  perpetrate  almost  any  crime  on  the 
calendar  and  come  clear;  but  in  this  land  where 
women  were  few  they  were  honored.  One  whis- 
l)er  from  the  Three  Bar  girl  that  Slade  had  raised 
his  hand  against  her  and,  powerful  as  he  was,  the 
hunt  for  him  would  be  on,  with  every  man's  hand 
against  him. 

His  arms  had  half  circled  her  when  he  whirled, 
catlike,  every  faculty  cool  and  alert,  as  a  voice 
sounded  from  the  door.  Both  had  been  too  en- 
grossed to  notice  its  noiseless  opening. 

"  I've  finished  cleaning  up  round  the  shop  and 
corrals,"  Harris  said.  "  Is  there  any  rubbish 
round  the  house  you'd  like  to  have  throwed  out 
and  piled  in  a  dry  gulch  somewheres  out  of 
sight?" 

He  stood  in  the  door,  half  facing  them,  his  left 
side  quartering  toward  Slade.  To  the  girl  it  ap- 
peared that  the  strange  pose  was  for  the  purpose 
of  enabling  him  to  take  a  quick  step  to  the  right 
and  spring  outside  if  Slade  should  make  a  move 
and  she  felt  a  tinge  of  scorn  at  his  precaution 


46  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

even  though  she  knew  that  it  would  avail  him 
nothing  if  Blade's  deadly  temper  were  roused 
by  the  insult.  Slade,  who  had  killed  many, 
would  add  Harris  to  his  list  before  he  could 
move. 

Slade's  understanding  of  the  quartering  posi- 
tion and  the  odd  sling  of  Harris's  gun  was  en- 
tirely different  and  as  he  shifted  his  feet  until  he 
faced  the  man  in  the  door,  his  movements  were 
slow  and  deliberate,  nothing  that  could  be  mis- 
construed. 

"  Who  summoned  you  in  here?  "  he  demanded. 

Harris  did  not  reply  but  stood  waiting  for 
some  word  from  the  girl.  She  had  a  sudden  sick 
dread  that  Slade  would  kill  him  and  was  sur- 
prised at  the  sentiment,  for  no  longer  than  an 
hour  before  she  had  wished  him  dead.  She  made 
belated  answer  to  his  original  question. 

"  No,"  she  said.    "  Go  on  out,  please." 

He  turned  his  back  on  Slade  and  went  out. 

"  And  you,"  she  said  to  Slade,  "  you'd  best  be 
going  too.  We've  been  too  good  neighbors  to 
quarrel — unless  you  come  over  again  with  the 
same  idea  you  did  to-day." 

At  sunset  the  girl  called  to  Harris  and  he  re- 
paired to  the  house  and  found  her  putting  a  hot 
meal  for  two  on  the  end  of  the  long  pine  table, 
the  first  time  she  had  deigned  to  eat  with  him 
since  that  first  meal. 

"  There's  no  use  of  our  going  on  like  this,"  she 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         47 

said.  **  We've  two  years  of  it  to  face;  so  it's  best 
to  get  on  some  kind  of  a  neutral  footing." 

For  her  own  peace  of  mind  she  had  tried  to 
smother  her  dislike  of  him  and  he  was  very  care- 
ful to  avoid  any  topic  that  would  rekindle  it. 
They  washed  the  dishes  together,  and  from  that 
hour  their  relations,  to  all  outward  appearance, 
were  friendly  or  at  least  devoid  of  open  hostility. 
They  no  longer  ate  separately;  she  did  not  avoid 
him  during  the  day,  and  the  second  evening  she 
prepared  two  places  at  her  own  table  in  the  big 
hving  room  before  the  fireplace. 

"  It's  so  empty  out  there,"  she  explained. 
"  With  only  the  two  of  us  at  a  table  built  for 
twenty." 

He  lingered  for  an  hour's  chat  before  her  fire 
and  each  evening  thereafter  was  the  same.  But 
he  knew  that  she  was  merely  struggling  to  make 
the  best  of  a  matter  that  was  distasteful,  that  her 
opinion  of  him  was  unaltered.  Her  bitterness 
could  not  be  entirely  concealed,  and  she  fre- 
quently touched  on  some  fresh  point  that  added 
to  her  distrust  of  his  present  motives  and  con- 
firmed her  belief  in  his  double-dealing  in  the  past. 
There  were  so  many  of  these  points;  his  refusal 
to  accept  her  offer  to  give  him  his  half-interest  if 
he  would  stay  off  the  place ;  his  weak  insinuations 
that  there  was  some  reason  why  he  must  spend 
two  years  on  the  Three  Bar;  his  prowling  the 
country  for  a  year  spying  on  the  methods  she  fol- 


48         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

lowed  in  running  the  outfit,  half  of  which  would 
soon  be  his ;  his  buying  the  school  section  and 
filing  on  ^  quarter  of  land,  the  location  blocking 
the  lower  end  of  the  Three  Bar  valley.  When- 
ever she  mentioned  one  of  these  he  refused  to 
take  issue  with  her.  And  one  night  she  touched 
on  still  another  point. 

"  What  was  the  reason  for  your  first  idea — of 
coming  here  imder  another  name? "  she  de- 
manded. 

"  I  thought  maybe  others  knew  I'd  been  left  a 
part  interest,"  he  said,  "  and  it  might  be  em- 
barrassing. The  way  it  is,  with  only  the  two  of 
us  knowing  the  inside,  I  can  stay  on  as  a  regular 
hand  until  the  time  is  up." 

"  You're  so  plausible,"  she  said.  "  You  put  it 
as  a  favor  to  me.  Did  it  ever  strike  you  that  if 
the  truth  were  known  it  might  also  be  uncom- 
fortable for  you? " 

He  smiled  across  at  her  and  once  more  she 
frowned  as  she  discovered  that  he  was  likeable 
for  all  his  underhandedness. 

"  Worse  than  that — suicidal,"  he  admitted. 
"If  you  mentioned  what  you  think  of  me,  that 
I've  framed  to  rob  you  by  law,  you  wouldn't  be 
bothered  w^ith  me  for  long."  He  laughed  softly 
and  stretched  his  feet  toward  the  fire.  "  Look  at 
it  any  way  you  like  and  I'm  in  bad  shape  to  deal 
you  any  misery,"  he  pointed  out.  "  If  you'd 
drop  a  hint  that  I'm  an  unwelcome  addition  it 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         49 

would  only  be  a  matter  of  days  until  I'd  fail  to 
show  up  for  meals.  If  you  view  it  from  that 
angle  you  can  see  I'm  setting  on  the  powder 
can." 

She  did  see  it,  but  had  not  so  clearly  realized 
it  till  he  pointed  it  out,  and  for  the  first  time  she 
wavered  in  her  conviction  that  he  had  come 
simply  to  deprive  her  of  her  rights.  But  the 
thought  that  her  father  would  not  easily  have 
willed  away  the  home  place  to  another  without 
being  unduly  influenced  served  to  reinstate  her 
distrust  along  with  a  vague  resentment  for  his 
having  shaken  it  by  throwing  himself  so  openly 
on  her  mercy. 

"  You  probably  thought  to  overcome  that  by 
reaching  the  point  the  whole  thing  so  patently 
aims  for,"  she  said.  "  And  you  calculated  well 
— arriving  at  a  time  when  we'd  be  alone  for  a 
week.  The  whole  scheme  was  based  on  that  idea 
and  I've  been  patiently  wondering  why  you  don't 
rush  matters  and  invite  me  to  marry  you." 

He  rose  and  flicked  the  ash  from  his  cigarette 
into  the  fireplace. 

"  I  do  invite  you — right  now,"  he  said,  and  in 
her  surprise  she  left  her  chair  and  stood  facing 
him.    "  I'd  like  real  well  to  have  you,  Billie." 

"  That's  the  final  proof,"  she  said.  "  I'm  sur- 
prised that  you  didn't  tell  me  the  first  day." 

"  So  am  I,"  he  said. 

She  found  no  answer  for  this  but  stood  silent, 


so  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

knowing  that  she  had  suddenly  become  afraid  of 
him. 

"  And  that's  the  living  truth,"  he  affirmed. 
"  Other  men  have  loved  you  the  first  day.  You 
know  men  well  enough  to  be  certain  that  I 
wouldn't  be  tied  to  one  woman  for  the  sake  of 
owning  a  few  head  of  cows — ^not  if  I  didn't  want 
her  for  herself."  He  waved  an  arm  toward  the 
door.  "  There's  milHons  of  miles  of  sage  just 
outside,"  he  said.  "  And  millions  of  cows — and 
girls." 

He  moved  across  to  her  and  stood  almost 
touching  her,  looking  down  into  her  face.  When 
Slade  had  stood  so  a  few  days  past  she  had  been 
coldly  indifferent  except  for  a  shiver  of  distaste 
at  the  thought  of  his  touching  her.  Before  Har- 
ris she  felt  a  weakening,  a  need  of  support,  and 
she  leaned  back  from  him  and  placed  one  hand 
behind  her  on  the  table. 

"  You  judge  for  yourself  whether  a  man 
wouldn't  be  right  foolish — with  all  those  things 
I  mentioned  being  right  outside  to  call  him — to 
marry  a  woman  he  didn't  want  for  herself,  be- 
cause she  had  a  few  hundred  head  of  cows."  He 
smiled  down  at  her.  "  Don't  pull  back  from  me, 
Billie ;  I  won't  lay  a  finger  on  you.  But  now  do 
you  think  it's  you  I  want — or  the  little  old  Three 
Bar?  " 

"  You  can  prove  it,"  she  said  at  last.  "  Prove 
it  by  going  away  for  six  months — or  three." 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  51 

He  shook  his  head, 

"  Not  that,"  he  said.  "  I've  told  you  I  was 
sewed  up  in  a  right  peculiar  way  myself — which 
wouldn't  matter  a  damn  if  it  wasn't  for  this.  I'd 
have  tossed  it  off  in  a  second  if  the  girl  on  the 
Three  Bar  had  turned  out  to  be  any  other  than 
you.  Now  I'm  going  to  see  it  through.  The 
Three  Bar  is  going  under — the  brand  both  our 
folks  helped  to  found — ^unless  some  one  pulls  it 
out  of  the  hole.  Believe  me  if  you  can  and  if  you 
can't — why,  you  know  that  one  remark  about  my 
being  unwelcome  here  will  clear  the  road  for  you, 
like  I  mentioned  a  few  minutes  back." 

He  turned  away  without  touching  her  and  she 
had  not  moved  when  the  door  closed  behind 
him. 

An  hour  past  noon  on  the  following  day  a 
drove  of  horses  appeared  at  the  lower  extremity 
of  the  valley  and  swept  on  toward  the  ranch.  As 
Harris  threw  open  the  gates  of  the  big  corral  he 
saw  her  standing  in  the  door  of  the  cookhouse 
watching  the  oncoming  drove.  Riders  flanked 
the  bunch  well  out  to  each  side  to  steady  it. 
There  was  a  roar  of  hoofs  and  a  stifling  cloud  of 
dust  as  three  hundred  half-wild  horses  clattered 
past  and  crowded  through  the  gates,  scattering 
swiftly  across  the  pasture  lot  back  of  the  corral. 
A  dozen  sweat-streaked  riders  swung  from  their 
saddles.  There  was  no  chance  to  distinguish 
color  or  kind  among  them  through  the  dust  caked 


52  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

in  the  week-old  growth  of  beard  that  covered 
every  face. 

One  man  remained  on  his  mount  and  followed 
the  horses  into  the  pasture  lot,  cutting  out  fifty 
or  more  and  heading  them  back  into  the  corral; 
for  Waddles  had  decreed  that  they  could  have 
the  rest  of  the  afternoon  off  for  a  jaunt  to  BrilFs 
Store  and  they  waited  only  to  change  mounts 
before  the  start. 

Calico  stood  drooping  sleepily  in  one  of  the 
smaller  corrals  and  Harris  moved  toward  him, 
intending  to  ride  over  with  the  rest  of  the  men. 

"  The  boss  said  for  you  to  ride  Blue,"  Morrow 
stated  as  Harris  passed  the  group  at  the  gates  of 
the  corral.    "  He's  clear  gentle-broke,  Blue  is." 

The  men  looked  up  in  surprise.  Morrow  had 
not  been  near  the  house  to  receive  instructions 
from  the  girl.  The  lie  had  been  so  apparent  as 
to  constitute  a  direct  challenge  to  the  other  man. 

Harris  stood  looking  at  him,  then  shrugged  his 
shoulders. 

"  Whatever  the  boss  says  goes  with  me,"  he 
returned  evenly. 

A  rangy  blue  roan  swept  past  with  the  fifty  or 
so  others.  At  least  once  every  round  of  the  corral 
he  laid  back  his  ears  and  squealed  as  he  scored 
some  other  horse  with  his  teeth,  then  lashed  out 
with  wicked  heels. 

"  I  reckon  that'll  be  Blue?  "  Harris  asked  of 
Evans  and  the  lanky  one  nodded.    The  men  scat- 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         53 

tered  round  the  corral  and  each  watched  his 
chance  to  put  his  rope  on  some  chosen  horse.  The 
roan  kept  others  always  between  himself  and  any 
man  with  a  rope  but  at  last  he  passed  Harris 
with  but  one  horse  between.  Harris  flipped  his 
noose  across  the  back  of  the  intervening  horse 
and  over  the  blue  roan's  head. 

Blue  stopped  the  instant  the  rope  tightened  on 
his  neck. 

"  You've  been  busted  and  rope-burnt  a  time 
or  two,"  Harris  remarked,  and  he  led  the  horse 
out  to  saddle  him.  The  big  blue  leaned  back, 
crouching  on  his  haunches  as  the  man  put  on  the 
hackamore.  His  eyes  rolled  wickedly  as  Harris 
smoothed  the  saddle  blanket  and  he  flinched  away 
with  a  whistling  snort  of  fear,  his  nostrils  flaring, 
as  the  heavy  saddle  was  thrown  on  his  back. 

Harris  tightened  the  front  cinch  and  the  blue 
horse  braced  himself  and  drew  in  a  long,  deep 
breath. 

"  That's  right,  Blue,  you  swell  up  and  inflate 
yourself,"  Harris  said.  "  I'll  have  to  squeeze  it 
out  of  you."  He  fastened  the  hind  cinch  loosely, 
then  returned  to  the  front  and  hauled  on  the 
latigo  until  the  pressure  forced  the  horse  to  re- 
lease the  indrawn  breath  and  it  leaked  out  of  him 
with  a  groaning  sigh. 

"  I  wonder  now  why  Morrow  is  whetting  his 
tommyhawk  for  me,"  Harris  remarked  as  he  in- 
spected the  big  roan.    "  You're  a  hard  one.  Blue, 


54  *      The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

I'll  let  that  saddle  warm  up  on  you  before  I  top 
you  off." 

Every  horse  pitched  a  few  jumps  from  force 
of  habit  when  first  mounted,  some  of  them  indif- 
ferently, others  viciously,  then  moved  restlessly 
around,  anxious  for  the  start. 

"  Well,  step  up  on  him  and  let's  be  going," 
Morrow  ordered  surlily. 

Harris  took  a  short  hold  on  the  rope  reins  of 
the  hackamore  with  his  left  hand,  cramped  the 
horse's  head  toward  him  and  gripped  the  mane, 
his  right  hand  on  the  horn,  and  swung  gently  to 
the  saddle,  easing  into  it  without  a  jar. 

"Easy,  Blue!"  he  said,  holding  up  the  big 
roan's  head.  "  Don't  you  hang  your  head  with 
me."  He  eased  the  horse  to  a  jerky  start  and 
they  were  off  for  Brill's  at  a  shuffling  trot.  Three 
times  in  the  first  mile  Blue  bunched  himself 
nervously  and  made  a  few  stiff  jumps  but  each 
time  Harris  held  him  steady.  The  pace  was  in- 
creased to  a  long,  swinging  trot  and  he  felt  the 
play  of  powerful  muscles  under  him  as  the  blue 
horse  seemed  to  reach  out  for  distance  at  every 
stride. 

"  You'd  have  made  one  good  little  horse. 
Blue,"  he  said,  "  if  some  sport  hadn't  spoiled  you 
on  the  start." 

"Don't  speak  loud  or  the  blue  horse  might 
shy  and  spill  his  pack,"  Morrow  remarked  in  a 
tone  loud  enough  for  Harris  to  overhear.    Evans 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  S5 

turned  in  his  saddle  and  eyed  the  dark  man 
curiously. 

"  He  won't  upset  his  load  to-day,"  he  proph- 
esied. "  Harris  is  just  past  the  colt  stage,  round 
twenty-seven  or  eight  somewheres,  and  has  out- 
growed  his  longing  to  show  off.  But  he'll  be  able 
to  sit  up  in  the  middle  of  anything  that  starts  to 
move  out  from  under  him." 

They  left  the  horses  drooping  at  the  several 
hitch  rails  before  the  post  and  crowded  in.  A 
f(  w  paused  along  the  counters  of  merchandise 
tliat  flanked  the  left  side  of  the  big  room  while  the 
rest  headed  straight  for  the  long  bar  that  ex- 
tended the  full  length  of  the  opposite  side.  The 
Three  Ba^.  men  had  scarcely  tossed  off  their  first 
diink  before  there  sounded  a  clatter  of  hoofs  out- 
side and  twelve  men  from  the  Halfmoon  D 
trooped  in. 

"Out  of  the  way!"  the  foremost  youth 
shouted.  "  Back  off  from  the  pine  slab,  you 
Three  Bar  soaks,  and  give  parched  folks  a 
chance.  Two  hours'  play  and  six  months'  work 
— so  don't  delay  me." 

The  throng  before  the  bar  was  a  riot  of  color; 
Angora  chaps  ranging  from  orange  and  lavender 
to  black  and  silky  white;  smooth  leather  chaps, 
and  stamped,  silver-ornamented  and  plain,  with 
heie  and  there  an  individual  design,  showing  that 
the  owner  had  selected  some  queerly  spotted  steer 
and  tanned  the  pelt  with  the  hair  on  to  be  fash- 


56         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

ioned  into  gaudy  vest  and  pants.  'Twas  an  im- 
provident, carefree  lot  who  lived  to-day  with 
scarce  a  thought  for  to-morrow.  The  clatter  of 
sardine  and  salmon  cans  mingled  with  the  clink 
of  glassware  at  the  bar  as  the  men  who  had 
missed  the  noon  meal  lunched  out  of  cans  between 
drinks. 

Some  few  detached  themselves  from  the  group 
and  occupied  themselves  with  writing.  Several 
started  a  game  of  stud  poker  at  one  of  the  many 
tables.  Harris  wrote  a  few  letters  before  joining 
in  the  play,  and  as  he  looked  up  from  time  to  time 
he  caught  many  curious  glances  leveled  upon 
him.  Morrow  had  been  busily  spreading  the  tid- 
ings that  a  would-be  squatter  was  among  them 
and  they  were  curious  to  see  the  man  who  had  de- 
liberately defied  the  unwritten  law  of  the  Cold- 
river  Range.  When  he  had  finished  his  writing 
he  crossed  over  to  the  group,  tossed  a  bill  on  the 
bar  and  waved  all  hands  to  a  drink. 

Waddles  had  instructed  Evans  to  start  the 
men  back  before  the  spree  had  progressed  to  a 
point  where  they  would  refuse  to  leave  Brill's 
and  so  leave  the  Three  Bar  short-handed.  At  the 
end  of  two  hours  he  looked  at  his  watch  and 
snapped  it  shut. 

"  Turn  out !  "  he  shouted.    "  On  your  horses !  " 

"  That  goes  for  my  men,  too,"  the  Halfmoon 
D  foreman  seconded.    "  Outside!  " 

Morrow  had  not  neglected  to  inform  the  men 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         57 

from  the  Halfmoon  D  that  Harris  gentled  his 
horses. 

"  Handle  the  little  roan  horse  gentle,"  he  ad- 
vised as  they  moved  toward  the  door.  "  Better 
hobble  your  stirrups  before  you  crawl  him." 
Several  men  turned  and  grinned.  In  riding  con- 
tests women  were  allowed  to  hobble  their  stirrups 
while  the  same  precaution  disqualified  a  man. 

Most  of  the  men  were  young,  scarcely  more 
than  boys,  full  of  rough  play  and  youthful  pride 
of  accomplishment  along  with  a  desire  to  make  a 
presumably  careless  display  of  it.  A  Halfmoon 
I)  youth  mounted  a  blocky  bay  and  as  he  threw 
his  leg  across  it  he  loosed  a  shrill  yip  and  reached 
forward  to  rake  the  horse's  shoulder.  The  bay 
dropped  his  head  and  performed.  A  half-dozen 
others  followed  his  example  and  their  horses 
pitched  off  in  as  many  directions.  All  eyes  were 
turned  on  Harris  as  he  neared  the  big  roan. 

"  Oh,  I  might  as  well  act  up  a  little,"  he  said  to 
Evans.    "  They  seem  to  be  looking  for  it." 

"  He's  a  hard  citizen,  that  roan,"  Evans  re-^ 
marked.    "  I'll  wrangle  for  you,  Cal." 

Harris  stepped  over  to  the  horse. 

"  I  wonder  what  old  Blue  can  do,"  he  said. 
He  hooked  the  roan  in  the  shoulder  as  he  mounted 
and  the  horse  plunged  his  head  between  his  knees 
aDd  rose  in  the  air.  The  big  roan  bawled  and  ex- 
pelled a  long-drawn  "  wa-a-augh  "  each  time  he 
stiiick  the  ground,  then  savagely  shook  his  whole 


58  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

frame  as  he  rose  again.  The  first  four  jumps 
Harris  swung  both  feet  forward  and  hooked  his 
shoulders  and  the  next  two  bounds  reached  back 
and  raked  his  flanks,  in  accordance  with  the  reg- 
ulation rules  prescribed  for  contest  riding. 

"  He's  riding  for  the  judges,"  a  megaphone 
voice  announced.  "  Boy,  you've  rode  your 
horse!" 

Blue  varied  his  leaps,  draping  himself  in  fan- 
tastic curves,  lighting  on  a  slant  with  his  side 
arched  out,  sunfishing  and  swapping  ends,  then 
threw  himself  over  and  smashed  down  on  his 
back.  Harris  slipped  sidewise  and  cleared  him- 
self. 

"  Fourteen  long  jumps,"  one  man  testified. 
"  One  hell  of  a  long  time  on  an  eel  like  that!  " 

As  Blue  regained  his  feet  Harris  stepped  into 
the  saddle  and  rose  with  him,  the  hackamore  rope 
trailing  loose  under  the  horse's  feet.  A  chorus 
of  approving  yelps  broke  out. 

"  Rake  him  from  ears  to  tail  roots! "  "  Ri-ide 
'im,  rider!"  "Hang  'em  up  into  that  horse!" 
"  Claw  him !  "    "  Scra-a-atch  him !  " 

This  wave  of  questionable  advice  ceased  as 
Blue,  after  three  short  jumps,  somersaulted  for- 
ward and  his  rider  made  a  headlong  side-dive  for 
safety. 

Evans  had  flanked  the  roan's  course  and  he  now 
leaned  from  the  saddle  and  seized  the  hackamore 
rope;  as  Blue  scrambled  to  his  feet  he  took  two 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         59 

quick  turns  of  the  rope  and  snubbed  his  head 
short  to  the  saddle  horn.  The  roan  struggled  and 
threw  himself,  his  head  still  suspended  by  the 
rope,  rose  and  reared  to  strike  savagely  at  the 
man  who  held  him,  but  Evans  left  his  saddle  and 
leaned  far  out,  his  right  foot  on  the  ground,  left 
still  in  the  stirrup,  and  eased  himself  back  into 
the  saddle  as  the  fighting  horse  slid  down.  He 
had  never  once  lost  his  hold  which  snubbed  Blue 
to  the  horn,  a  pretty  bit  of  wrangling. 

"  He's  on  the  fight  now,"  Evans  said.  ''  111 
hold  him  solid  till  he  cools  down — which  won't  be 
long,  for  Cal  didn't  cut  him  any;  he  was  swing- 
ing his  feet  free  and  never  hooked  him  once."  He 
jerked  his  thumb  at  the  roan's  shoulder  and 
flanks  where  not  a  drop  of  blood  appeared;  his 
liide  would  have  been  tattered  indeed  if  Harris 
had  driven  home  his  rowels  each  time  he  swung 
liis  feet.    "  Nice  ride." 

Harris  walked  back  to  a  small  group  that  had 
not  yet  mounted,  Morrow  among  them.  His  left 
side  was  quartering  toward  Morrow  and  appar- 
ently he  was  addressing  the  group  as  a  whole  in- 
stead of  any  one  man. 

"  The  next  time  some  one  frames  me  to  put  on 
a  show  like  that,"  he  said,  "  why,  he'd  better  make 
certain  beforehand  about  what  part  he's  willing 
to  play  in  the  performance  himself — for  next 
time  I  won't  take  it  out  of  the  horse." 


IV 

It  is  said  that  there  comes  a  day  in  the  life  of 
every  handler  of  bad  horses  when  he  will  mount 
one  and  ride  him  out,  master  him  and  dismount, 
— and  forever  after  decline  to  ride  another. 
Riley  Foster  was  evidence  of  this.  For  three 
years  Rile  and  Bangs  had  been  inseparable,  rid- 
ing together  on  every  job,  and  the  shaggy  youth 
topped  off  the  animals  in  Foster's  string  before 
the  older  man  would  mount  them.  As  Bangs 
went  about  his  work  his  faded  blue  eyes  were  ever 
turned  toward  the  Three  Bar  boss  who  stood  in 
the  door  of  the  blacksmith  shop. 

The  girl  was  vaguely  troubled  as  she  noted 
this.  Bangs  and  Foster  had  returned  for  their 
second  season  at  the  Three  Bar.  All  through  the 
previous  summer  the  boy  had  evidenced  his  silent 
adoration,  his  eyes  following  her  every  move. 

The  scene  round  Billie  was  one  of  strenuous 
activity,  every  effort  bent  toward  whipping  the 
remuda  into  shape  for  the  calf  round-up  in  the 
least  possible  space  of  time. 

Every  rider  must  have  nine  horses  in  his  string. 
His  five  circle  horses  needed  but  little  training, 
the  only  necessary  qualifications  being  endurance 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         61 

and  a  sufficient  amount  of  breaking  to  make  it 
])ossible  to  saddle  them;  the  two  night  mounts 
must  be  partially  broken  to  work  the  herd,  then 
switched  to  night  guarding  and  thereafter  used 
exclusively  for  that.  But  the  two  cow  horses  re- 
(luired  long  and  skilful  training.  Every  man 
gave  one  of  his  circle  string  the  preliminary  train- 
ing of  the  cow  horse  each  season,  the  work  re- 
sumed by  the  man  to  whose  string  the  horse  was 
allotted  the  following  year;  thus  new  ones  were 
coming  on  to  replace  the  older  horses  as  fast  as 
they  were  condemned. 

Four  pairs  of  men  worked  within  a  hundred 
yards  of  the  girl,  taking  equal  turns  at  riding  and 
wrangling.  The  one  who  wrangled  put  his  rope 
on  a  horse  and  led  him  out,  snubbed  him  to  the 
saddle  horn  and  frequently  eared  him  as  well, 
while  the  one  who  was  to  ride  him  out  cinched  on 
his  saddle  and  mounted. 

Green  horses  were  led  out,  one  after  another, 
to  be  saddled  for  the  first  time,  and  those  pre- 
viously broken  required  a  few  work-outs  to  knock 
the  wire  edge  off  their  unwillingness  to  carry  a 
rider  after  a  winter  of  freedom  on  the  range. 

Three  men  were  shoeing  horses  tied  to  snub- 
bing posts  at  ten-yard  intervals  before  the  shop. 
One  animal  that  had  fought  viciously  against  this 
treatment  had  been  thrown  and  stretched,  his 
four  feet  roped  to  convenient  posts,  and  while  he 
struggled  and  heaved  on  the  ground  Rile  Foster 


62  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

calmly  fitted  and  nailed  the  shoes  on  him.  Cal 
Harris  finished  shoeing  the  colt  he  was  working. 

"  That's  the  last  touch,"  he  said.  "  My  string 
is  all  set  to  go." 

"  You  have  five  colts  gentled  for  your  circle 
bunch,"  she  said.  "  But  you  didn't  pick  a  single 
cow  horse.  The  boys  have  sorted  out  the  best 
ones  and  the  few  that  are  left  won't  answer  for  a 
man  that  insists  on  a  gentled  string." 

"  Creamer  and  Calico  will  do  for  me,"  he  said. 
"  I  broke  them  myself  and  maybe  I  can  worry 
along." 

"  Did  you  break  them  like  that? "  she  asked. 
Bangs  was  topping  a  horse  that  strenuously  re- 
fused to  be  conquered  and  as  they  looked  on  the 
animal  threw  himself. 

"  Like  that?  Well,  no — ^not  precisely,"  Har- 
ris said.  "  They're  not  breaking  horses. 
They're  proving  that  they're  bronc-peelers  that 
can  ride  'em  before  they're  broke.  A  horse 
started  out  that  way  will  be  a  bronc  till  the  day 
he  dies.  The  first  thing  he  knows  some  straddler 
swarms  him  and  hangs  the  spurs  in  him.  He 
bogs  his  head  and  starts  out  to  slip  his  pack — and 
from  right  then  on  he  thinks  the  first  thing  to  do 
whenever  a  man  steps  up  on  him  is  to  try  his  best 
to  shake  him  off." 

Three  men  were  lashing  their  bed  rolls  and 
war  bags  on  three  pack  horses  and  when  this  task 
was  completed  they  rode  down  the  lane,  each  one 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  63 

leading  his  pack  animal.  Harris  knew  this  as 
evidence  that  they  would  start  after  the  calves 
on  the  following  day.  The  custom  was  to  ex- 
change representatives  to  ride  with  each  wagon 
within  a  reasonable  distance,  the  reps  to  look 
after  the  interest  of  the  brand  for  which  they 
rode. 

"  How  many  reps  do  you  trade? "  he  asked. 

"  Three,"  she  said.  "  Halfmoon  D,  V  L  and 
with  Slade." 

The  Halfmoon  D  lay  some  fifteen  miles  east- 
ward along  the  foot  of  the  hills ;  the  V  L  the  same 
distance  to  the  west,  but  cached  away  in  a  pocket 
that  led  well  back  into  the  base  of  the  range,  a 
comparatively  small  outfit  owned  by  the  Bran- 
dons, father  and  four  sons,  who  made  every  effort 
to  keep  the  bulk  of  their  cows  ranging  in  their 
own  home  basin  and  exchanged  reps  only  with 
the  Three  Bar. 

Slade's  home  place  lay  forty  miles  south  and  a 
little  west  and  his  cows  grazed  for  over  a  hun- 
dred miles,  requiring  three  wagons  to  cover  his 
range. 

During  the  afternoon  the  three  reps  came  in  to 
]*eplace  the  men  who  had  left.  The  surplus 
horses  had  been  cut  out  and  thrown  back  on  the 
range,  only  those  required  for  the  remuda  re- 
maining in  the  pasture  lot.  The  chuck  wagon 
was  wheeled  before  the  cookhouse  door  and 
packed   for   an   early   start.     Before   the   first 


64         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

streaks  of  dawn  the  men  had  saddled  and  break- 
fasted. It  was  turning  gray  in  the  east  when 
four  horses,  necessitating  the  attentions  of  four 
men,  were  hooked  to  the  wagon.  A  man  hung  on 
the  bit  of  each  wheel  horse  while  another 
grasped  the  bits  of  the  lead  team  as  Waddles 
made  one  last  hasty  trip  inside. 

"  This  will  be  a  rocky  ride  for  a  mile  or  two," 
he  prophesied,  as  he  mounted  the  seat  and  braced 
himself.  "  These  willow-tails  haven't  had  on  a 
strap  of  harness  for  many  a  month.  All  set. 
Turn  loose!" 

The  men  stepped  back  and  the  four  horses  hit 
the  collars  raggedly.  One  wheel  horse  reared 
and  jumped  forward.  The  off  leader  dropped 
his  head  and  pitched,  shaking  himself  as  if  strug- 
gling to  unseat  a  rider,  then  the  four  settled  into 
a  jerky  run  and  the  heavy  wagon  clattered  and 
lurched  down  the  lane. 

"  Fine  way  to  break  work  stock,"  Harris  re- 
marked to  Evans.  "  That  layout  would  bring 
maybe  a  dollar  a  head." 

The  men  swung  to  their  saddles  and  followed 
the  wagon  at  a  shuffling  trot.  From  where  she 
rode  between  Evans  and  Harris,  the  girl  turned 
in  her  saddle  and  watched  two  men  throw  open 
the  gates  of  the  big  corral  where  the  remuda  was 
held.  The  wrangler,  whose  duty  it  was  to  tend 
the  horse  herd  by  day,  and  the  nighthawk  who 
would  guard  it  at  night  sat  on  their  horses  at  the 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         65 

far  end  of  the  corral  and  urged  the  herd  out  as 
the  gates  swung  back.  The  remuda  streamed 
down  the  valley,  the  two  first  riders  swinging 
wide  to  either  flank  while  the  nighthawk  and 
wrangler  brought  up  the  rear. 

The  four  that  pulled  the  wagon  had  settled  to  a 
steady  gait  and  when  some  three  miles  below  the 
Three  Bar  Waddles  wheeled  to  the  right  and 
mgled  up  the  bench  that  flanked  the  bottoms,  the 
wagon  tilting  perilously  in  the  ascent,  then  struck 
out  westward  across  a  rolling  country  that 
showed  not  even  a  wagon  track.  The  big  cook 
unerringly  picked  the  route  of  least  resistance  to 
the  point  from  which  the  first  circle  would  be 
launched,  striking  every  wash  and  coulee  at  a 
place  where  a  crossing  was  possible. 

Shortly  before  noon  the  wagon  was  halted  in  a 
])road  bottom  threaded  by  a  tiny  spring- fed 
stream.  The  teams  were  unhitched;  mounts 
were  unsaddled  and  thrown  into  the  horse  herd, 
which  was  then  headed  into  the  mouth  of  a 
])ranching  draw  and  allowed  to  graze.  Waddles 
(lumped  off  the  bed  rolls  that  were  piled  from  the 
broad  lowered  tail-gate  to  the  wagon  top  and 
e  ach  man  sorted  out  his  own  and  spread  it  upon 
some  spot  which  struck  him  as  a  likely  bed 
ground. 

One  man  carried  water  from  the  stream.  Two 
others  snaked  in  wood  for  the  chuck-wagon  fire. 
Still  another  drove  long  stakes  in  the  shape  of  a 


66  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

hollow  square,  stretching  a  single  rope  from 
one  to  the  next  and  fashioning  a  frail  rope 
corral. 

Harris  and  Evans  took  three  poles  that  were 
slung  under  the  wagon,  looped  the  top-rope  of  a 
little  teepee  round  the  small  ends  of  them  and 
erected  the  three,  tripod  fashion,  after  having  first 
pegged  down  the  teepee  sides.  Harris  brought 
the  girFs  bed  roll  and  war  bag  from  the  wagon 
and  j)laced  them  inside. 

"  There's  your  house,"  he  said.  "All  ready  to 
move  in." 

The  men  repaired  to  the  creek  bank  and 
splashed  faces  and  hands.  The  big  voice  of  the 
cook  bellowed  angrily  from  the  wagon. 

"  Downstream !  Downstream !  "  he  boomed. 
"  Get  below  that  water  hole!  " 

Two  men  who  had  elected  to  perform  their  ab- 
lutions above  the  point  from  which  the  culinary 
water  supply  was  drawn  moved  hastily  down- 
stream. 

It  was  not  long  before  Waddles  was  dispens- 
ing nourishment  from  the  lowered  tail-gate, 
ladling  food  and  hot  coffee  into  the  plates  and 
cups  which  the  men  held  out  to  him.  They  drew 
away  and  sat  cross-legged  on  the  ground.  The 
meal  was  almost  finished  when  six  horsemen  rode 
down  the  valley  and  pulled  up  before  the  wagon. 

"What's  the  chance  for  scraps?"  the  leader 
asked. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  67 

"  Step  down,"  Waddles  invited.  "And  throw 
a  feed  in  you.     She's  still  a-steaming." 

Four  of  the  men  differed  in  no  material  way 
from  the  Three  Ear  men  in  appearance.  The 
fifth  was  a  ruffian  with  little  forehead,  a  face  of 
gorilla  cast,  stamped  with  brute  ferocity  and 
small  intelligence.  The  last  of  the  six  was  a 
striking  figure,  a  big  man  with  pure  white  hair 
and  brows,  his  pale  eyes  peering  from  a  red 
face. 

"  The  roasted  albino  is  Harper,  our  leading 
bad  man  in  these  parts,"  Evans  remarked  to 
Harris.  "And  the  human  ape  is  Lang;  Fisher, 
Coleman,  Barton  and  Canfield  are  the  rest.  Nice 
layout  of  murderers  and  such." 

Harper's  men  ate  unconcernedly,  conscious 
that  they  were  marked  as  men  w^ho  had  violated 
(ivery  law  on  the  calendar,  but  knowing  also  that 
no  man  would  take  exceptions  to  their  presence 
on  that  general  ground  alone,  and  as  they  had 
neared  the  wagon  each  man  had  scanned  the  faces 
of  the  round-up  crew  to  make  certain  that  there 
^\^ere  none  among  them  who  might  bear  some 
raore  specific  and  personal  dislike. 

The  Three  Bar  men  chatted  and  fraternized 
with  them  as  they  would  have  done  with  the 
riders  of  any  legitimate  outfit.  Harper  praised 
the  food  that  Waddles  tendered  them. 

Billie  Warren  forced  a  smile  as  she  nodded  to 
them,  then  moved  off  and  sat  upon  a  rock  some 


68  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

fifty  yards  from  the  wagon,  despising  the  six  men 
who  ate  her  fare  and  inwardly  raging  at  the  con- 
ditions which  forced  her  to  extend  the  hospitality 
of  the  Three  Bar  to  men  of  their  breed  whenever 
they  chanced  by. 

Harris  strolled  over  and  sat  down  facing  her, 
sifting  tobacco  into  a  brown  paper  and  deftly 
rolling  his  smoke. 

"  Has  it  been  on  your  mind — ^what  I  was  tell- 
ing you  a  few  nights  back,  about  how  much  I  was 
loving  you?  "  he  asked. 

"  You  had  your  chance  to  prove  it  by  going 
away,"  she  said,  "  and  refused;  so  why  bring  it  up 
again?  The  next  two  years  will  be  hard  enough 
without  my  having  to  listen  to  that." 

"  Our  families  must  have  been  real  set  on 
throwing  us  together,"  he  observed.  "  I  was  cut 
off  without  a  dime  myself — ^unless  I  spent  two 
full  years  on  the  Three  Bar." 

She  was  angry  with  herself  for  believing  him 
sincere,  for  being  convinced  that  he  too,  as  he  had 
several  times  intimated,  was  tied  in  much  the 
same  fashion  as  herself.  The  explanation  came 
to  her  in  an  illuminating  flash.  The  elder  Harris 
must  have  nursed  a  lifelong  enmity  against  her 
father,  who  had  believed  him  the  most  devoted 
friend  on  earth. 

She  had  often  Heard  the  tale  of  how  her  parent 
had,  in  all  friendliness,  followed  old  Bill  Harris 
step  by  step  from  Dodge  City  to  the  Platte,  to 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         69 

old  Fort  Laramie  and  finally  to  the  present 
Three  Bar  range.  Perhaps  the  one  so  followed 
had  felt  that  Cal  Warren  was  but  the  hated  sym- 
bol of  the  whole  clan  of  squatters  who  had  driven 
him  from  place  to  place  and  eventually  forced 
him  to  relinquish  his  hope  of  seeing  the  Three 
Bar  brand  on  a  hundred  thousand  cows ;  that  his 
friendliness  had  been  simulated,  his  vindictive- 
ness  nursed  and  finally  consummated  by  leaving 
his  affairs  in  such  fashion  that  his  son  must  carry 
on  the  work  his  trickery  had  begun. 

The  voice  of  Waddles  reached  them.  He  was 
announcing  a  half-day  of  rest,  according  to  her 
orders. 

"  It's  kill-time  for  the  rest  of  the  day,"  he 
stated.     "  Make  the  most  of  it." 

For  three  weeks  past,  excepting  for  the  trip  to 
Brill's,  the  men  had  toiled  incessantly,  breakfast- 
ing before  sunup  and  seeking  their  bimks  long 
nfter  dark.  Some  immediately  turned  to  their 
bed  rolls  to  make  up  lost  sleep.  Others  repaired 
to  the  stream  to  wash  out  extra  articles  of  soiled 
clothing  before  taking  their  rest. 

Harris  resumed  where  he  had  broken  off  some 
five  minutes  before. 

"And  I'd  have  tossed  it  off,  as  I  told  you  once, 
if  the  Three  Bar  girl  had  turned  out  to  be  any 
except  you.  You've  had  a  tough  problem  to 
A^'ork  out,  girl,"  he  said.  "  I  sold  out  my  little 
Box  L  outfit  for  more  than  it  was  worth — and 


70         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

figured  to  stop  the  leak  at  the  Three  Bar  and  put 
the  old  brand  on  its  feet." 

His  calm  assurance  on  this  point  exasperated 
the  girl. 

"  How? "  she  demanded.  "  What  can  you 
do?  "  She  pointed  toward  the  six  men  near  the 
wagon.  "  During  the  time  you  spent  prowling 
the  hills  did  you  ever  come  across  those  men?  " 

"  Not  to  pal  round  with  them,"  he  confessed. 
"  But  I  did  cut  their  trail  now  and  then." 

"  Then  don't  you  know  what  every  other  man 
in  this  country  knows — that  those  six  and  a  lot 
more  of  their  breed  are  responsible  for  every  loss 
within  a  hundred  miles?  They  can  operate 
against  a  brand  one  week  and  stop  at  the  home 
ranch  and  get  fed  the  next.  That's  where  the 
Three  Bar  loss  comes  in.  And  I  have  to  feed 
them  when  they  come  along." 

"  Some  day  we'll  feed  them  and  hang  them 
right  after  the  meal,"  he  said.  "  They're  not  the 
outfit  that's  going  to  be  hardest  to  handle  when 
the  time  arrives." 

"  What  do  you  mean?  "  she  asked.  "  No  one 
has  ever  been  able  to  handle  them  u]3  to  date." 

"  Did  it  ever  strike  you  as  queer  that  Slade 
could  come  into  this  country  twelve  years  back, 
with  nothing  but  a  long  rope  and  a  running  iron, 
and  be  owning  thirty  thousand  head  to-day?  " 

"  He  has  the  knack  to  protect  his  own  and  in- 
crease," she  said.     "  They're  afraid  of  Slade." 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         71 

Harris  absently  traced  the  Three  Bar  in  the 
dust  with  a  stick,  then  fashioned  the  V  L  and  the 
Halfmoon  D,  the  three  brands  that  ranged  along 
the  foot  of  the  hills.  With  a  few  deft  strokes 
he  transformed  the  Three  Bar  into  the  Three 
Cross  T,  reworked  the  V  L  into  a  Diamond  Box 
and  the  Halfmoon  D  into  Circle  P,  each  one  of 
the  worked-overs  representing  one  of  the  dozen 
or  so  brands  registered  by  Slade.  He  blotted 
out  his  handiwork  with  the  flat  of  his  hand. 

"  Don't  you  suppose  that  the  owner  of  every 
one  of  those  brands  knows  that? "  she  scoffed. 
'*A  clumsy  rebrand  would  loom  up  for  a  mile. 
Slade's  no  fool." 

"  Not  in  a  thousand  years,"  Harris  agreed. 
'*  I  was  just  commenting  on  how  peculiar  it  was 
that  the  three  brands  he  runs  farthest  north 
should  be  so  easy  worked  over  into  any  one  of  the 
three  that  his  range  overlaps  up  this  way.  And 
I  happen  to  know  his  farthest  south  brands  would 
^vork  out  the  same  way  with  the  outfits  at  the 
other  end  of  his  range.  But  he  earmarks  all  of 
his  brands  the  same — with  jinglebobs;  and  jin- 
glebobs  most  generally  drop  off  and  leave  noth- 
ing but  a  good  big  piece  absent  out  of  the  ear." 

"  So  you  think  a  man  as  big  as  Slade  is  stupid 
enough  to  try  his  hand  at  brand-blotting  on  all 
sides  at  once?  "  she  asked. 

"  No;  nor  even  once  on  one  side,"  he  returned. 
**  Not  him.     The  one  fact  that  the  similarity  of 


72         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

brands  would  make  it  easy  to  fall  into  the  habit  is 
enough  to  keep  every  outfit  watching  him.  He 
couldn't  start — and  knows  it." 

"  Then  what  does  it  all  amount  to?  "  she  asked. 

"  While  folks  watch  him  on  that  score  he  could 
work  in  a  dozen  ways  that  don't  concern  those 
brands  at  all,"  he  said. 

The  girl  shook  her  head  impatiently  and  looked 
across  at  the  six  men  who  ate  her  fare. 

"  Look  at  them,"  she  flared.  "  Eating  my 
food;  and  in  a  few  nights  they'll  be  hazing  a 
bunch  of  Three  Bar  steers  toward  the  Idaho  line. 
Why  doesn't  some  man  that  is  a  man  kill  that 
albino  fiend  and  all  his  whelps  and  rid  the  coun- 
try of  his  breed?  Even  Slade  lets  them  put  up 
at  his  place." 

"  If  they're  pestering  you  I'll  order  them  off," 
he  said. 

"  And  what  effect  would  that  have? "  she  in- 
quired scornfully. 

"  The  effect  of  causing  them  to  climb  their 
horses  and  amble  off  down  the  country,"  he  re- 
turned. He  sprawled  on  the  grass,  his  head 
propped  on  one  hand  as  he  regarded  them. 

"  Then  probably  you'd  better  order  them  off," 
she  suggested.  "  You  have  my  permission. 
Now's  your  chance  to  make  good  the  lordly  brag 
of  helping  the  Three  Bar  out  of  the  hole."  She 
instantly  regretted  having  said  it.  A  dozen 
times  of  late  she  had  wondered  if  she  were  turn- 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  73 

ing  bitter  and  waspish,  if  she  would  ever  again  be 
the  even-tempered  Billie  Warren  with  a  good 
word  and  a  smile  for  every  one. 

Harris  was,  as  always,  apparently  undisturbed 
by  her  words.  Far  down  the  bottoms  she  could 
see  a  point  of  light  which  she  knew  for  a  white 
sign  that  read:  "  Squatter,  don't  let  sundown 
find  you  here."  The  man  before  her  had  defied 
these  sinister  warnings  scattered  about  the  range 
and  publicly  announced  that  he  would  put  in  hay 
on  his  filing,  knowing  that  he  was  a  marked  man 
i'rom  the  hour  he  turned  the  first  furrow.  What- 
( ver  his  shortcomings,  lack  of  courage  was  not 
one  of  them. 

"  I  take  that  back,"  she  said,  referring  to  her 
words  of  a  few  moments  before.  Harris  straight- 
ened to  a  sitting  position  in  his  surprise  at  this 
impulsive  retraction,  and  as  he  smiled  across  at 
her  she  divined  that  this  man,  seemingly  so  im- 
pervious to  her  sarcasm,  could  be  easily  moved  by 
a  single  kind  word. 

"  Thanks,  Billie,"  he  said.  "  That  was  real 
white  of  you." 

He  rose  and  sauntered  toward  the  wagon  and 
I^illie  Warren  felt  a  sudden  clutch  of  fear  as  he 
halted  before  Harper  and  she  realized  that  he  had 
taken  her  words  literally  and  intended  ordering 
them  off. 

"  I've  been  made  temporary  foreman  of  the 
Three  Bar — just  so  the  boss  could  try  me  out  on 


74  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

that  job  for  an  hour  or  two,"  he  remarked  con- 
versationally. "  So  I'm  putting  in  a  new  rule 
that  goes  into  effect  right  off.  When  you  boys 
ride  away,  in  a  few  minutes  from  now,  you  can 
tell  folks  that  the  grub  line  is  closed  as  far  as  the 
Three  Bar  is  concerned." 

Lang  took  a  half-step  toward  him,  his  face  re- 
flecting his  gathering  rage  as  his  slow  brain  com- 
prehended the  fact  that  this  speech  was  but  an- 
other way  of  announcing  that  he  and  his  men 
would  find  no  welcome  at  the  Three  Bar  from 
that  moment  on.  Harper  caught  his  arm  and 
jerked  him  back.  The  albino  was  an  old  hand 
and  could  rightly  read  the  signs. 

"  The  gentleman  was  remarking  to  me,"  he 
said  to  Lang;  *'  not  you."  He  turned  to  Harris, 
noting  as  he  did  so  that  every  Three  Bar  man,  ex- 
cepting those  asleep,  had  suddenly  evidenced 
keen  interest  in  what  was  transpiring  there;  sev- 
eral carelessly  shifted  their  positions.  "  There's 
no  law  to  make  you  feed  any  man,"  he  said  to 
Harris.  "  From  now  on  we'll  pay  our  way — as 
far  as  the  Three  Bar  is  concerned." 

His  tones  were  casual;  only  his  pale  eyes,  fas- 
tened unblinkingly  on  Harris's  face,  betrayed  his 
real  feeling  toward  the  man  who,  notwithstand- 
ing the  roundabout  nature  of  his  announcement, 
had  practically  ordered  him  to  stay  away  from 
the  Three  Bar  for  all  time. 

"  But  even  in  the  face  of  that,"  he  resumed, 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  75 

'  *  we'll  welcome  you  any  time  you  happen  to  ride 
down  our  way." 

Every  man  within  earshot  understood  the 
threat  that  lay  beneath  the  casual  words. 

"  Then  I'll  likely  drop  in  some  time,"  Harris 
said.  "  If  you'll  send  word  where  it  is.  And 
I'll  bring  fifty  men  along." 

The  albino  motioned  his  men  toward  their 
liorses  and  they  mounted  and  rode  oif  down  the 
bottoms.  Harris  walked  back  and  resumed  his 
seat  near  the  girl,  who  sat  looking  at  him  as  if  she 
could  not  believe  what  she  had  just  witnessed. 

"  You  see  it  was  just  as  easy  as  I'd  counted 
on,"  he  said.  "  It'll  be  a  considerable  saving  on 
food." 

"  But  how  did  you  know?  "  she  asked.  "  Why 
is  Harper  afraid  of  you?  " 

"  He's  not,"  Harris  said.  "  Not  for  a  single 
second.  But  he's  an  old  hand  and  has  left  a  few 
places  on  the  jump  before  he  came  out  here." 

"  And  he  thinks  you  know  it!  "  she  guessed. 

"He  don't  care  what  I  know;  it's  what  he 
knows  himself — that  the  wild  bunch  is  always 
roosting  on  the  powder  can  even  when  it  appears 
like  they're  sitting  pretty — that  counts  with  him. 
"i'ou  thought  I  was  taking  a  fool  chance  of  out- 
gaming  him.  In  reality  I  was  taking  almost  an 
unfair  advantage  of  him,  providing  he  had  the 
brains  he  must  possess  to  have  lived  to  his  age." 

She  could  find  no  ready-made  answer  to  this 


76  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

surprising  statement.  He  sprawled  comfortably 
on  the  grass,  turning  over  in  his  mind  the  condi- 
tions that  were  but  a  repetition  of  the  history  of 
so  many  frontiers;  first  the  earliest  settlers  re- 
senting the  intrusion  of  the  later  ones  and  resort- 
ing to  lawless  means  of  protecting  their  priority ; 
then  the  strengthening  of  the  outlaw  element, 
half  the  countryside  in  league  with  the  wild 
bunch,  the  two  opposing  factions  secretly  hiring 
the  predatory  class  to  prey  upon  rival  interests ; 
then,  inevitably,  the  clean  split,  usually  occa- 
sioned by  the  outlaws  having  increased  in  power 
until  they  felt  competent  to  defy  both  sides,  to 
play  both  ends  against  the  middle,  to  commit 
atrocities  that  opened  the  eyes  of  those  who,  be- 
lieving they  had  subsidized  the  lawless,  suddenly 
woke  to  the  fact  that  they  had  subsidized  them- 
selves ;  then  the  outlaws,  in  their  turn,  discovering 
that  every  man's  hand  was  against  them;  the 
ruthless  establishing  of  a  definite  line  between 
those  inside  and  those  outside  the  law,  replacing 
the  vague  middle  ground  of  semi-lawlessness. 
Always  their  friends  fell  away  from  them,  those 
secretly  leagued  with  them  fearing  to  be  seen  in 
their  company,  and  those  not  too  definitely 
known  to  belong  to  their  ranks  invariably  quit- 
ting them  cold,  often  joining  forces  against  them 
and  developing  into  more  or  less  substantial 
citizens,  according  to  the  standards  of  their 
day. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  77 

"  Don't  you  know  that  the  albino  will  kill  you 
for  that?  "  the  girl  asked  at  length. 

"  Not  unless  he  can  stage  it  as  a  personal  quar- 
rel," he  said.  "  He'll  never  follow  it  up  as  com- 
ing out  of  what  happened  to-day  by  taking  it  out 
on  me  as  temporary  foreman  of  the  Three  Bar — 
for  ordering  him  off." 

"Why?"  she  puzzled.  "What  possible  dif- 
ference would  that  make  to  a  man  like  him?  " 

"  Just  this,"  he  said:  "  There's  a  good  major- 
ity of  folks  that  don't  relish  seeing  Harper's 
hunch  ride  up — that  feed  them  through  policy. 
But  whenever  you  make  it  plain  to  a  man  that 
he's  compelled  to  do  a  thing  whether  he  likes  it  or 
not  it's  ten  to  one  he'll  balk  out  of  sheer  human 
pride.  If  Harper  kills  the  Three  Bar  foreman 
on  the  grounds  that  he  refused  to  feed  all  his  men 
— ^why  then,  right  off,  every  other  foreman  and 
owner  within  a  hundred  miles  starts  to  resenting 
the  possibility  that  maybe  the  albino  feels  the 
same  way  toward  him.     Harper  knows  that." 

"  But  if  your  theory  had  been  wrong? "  she 
persisted.     "  What  then?  " 

"  Then,"  he  said,  "  then  there'd  have  been 
hell  and  repeat.  I  wasn't  just  acting  as  me,  a 
personal  affair,  but,  as  I  took  pains  to  remark 
aloud,  as  the  foreman  of  the  Three  Bar.  Every 
Three  Bar  man  would  have  gone  into  action  the 
second  Harper  made  a  move  at  me.  You  know 
that — and  Harper  Imew  it." 


78  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

She  realized  the  soundness  of  this  statement. 
The  one  unalterable  code  of  the  country,  a  code 
that  had  been  fostered  till  it  eclipsed  all  others, 
decreed  that  a  man  should  be  loyal  to  the  brand 
for  which  he  rode.  The  whole  fabric  of  the  cow 
business  was  based  on  that  one  point. 

"And  a  wrangle  of  that  magnitude  was  some- 
thing he  couldn't  risk,"  Harris  said.  "  It  would 
stir  folks  up,  and  any  time  they're  stirred  a  mite 
too  far  Harper  has  come  to  the  end  of  his  rope. 
Any  other  brand  could  have  done  the  same — only 
folks  fall  into  a  set  habit  of  mind  and  figure 
they  must  do  what  others  do  just  because  it's 
custom." 

"  But  now  they'll  work  their  deviltry  all  the 
stronger  against  the  Three  Bar,"  she  predicted. 
"  They  could  wreck  us  if  they  tried.  You 
couldn't  get  a  conviction  in  five  years.  Not  a 
man  would  testify  against  one  of  Harper's  out- 
fit." 

"  Then  we'll  put  on  a  fighting  crew  and  hold 
them  off,"  he  said.  "  But  that's  not  the  layout 
that  will  be  hardest  to  handle  in  the  long  run. 
Slade  is  the  one  real  hard  nut  for  the  Three  Bar 
to  crack.  He  can  work  it  a  dozen  different  ways 
and  you  couldn't  prove  one  of  them  on  him  to 
save  your  soul.  He's  one  smooth  hombre — 
Slade." 

Harris  rose  and  headed  for  his  bed  roll  and  the 
girl  sought  the  shelter  of  her  teepee  for  a  rest. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  79 

All  was  quiet  near  the  wagon  till  Waddles 
boomed  the  summons  to  feed.  After  the  meal  a 
youth  named  Moore  mounted  a  saddled  horse 
that  was  picketed  nearby  and  rode  up  a  branch- 
ing gulch,  returning  with  a  dry  cedar  log  which 
he  snaked  to  the  wagon  at  the  end  of  his  rope* 
After  a  few  hours'  rest  and  the  prospects  of  a  full 
night's  sleep  ahead  the  hands  snatched  an  hour 
for  play. 

They  sat  cross-legged  round  the  fire  kindled 
from  the  cedar  and  raised  their  voices  in  song. 
Waddles  drew  forth  a  guitar  and  picked  a  few 
chords.  Bentley,  the  man  who  repped  for  Slade, 
carried  the  air  and  the  rest  joined  in.  The  voices 
were  untrained  but  from  long  experience  in  ren- 
dering every  song  each  man  carried  his  part  with- 
out a  discordant  note.  Evans  sang  a  perfect 
bass,  Bangs  a  clear  tenor;  Moore  faked  a  bari- 
tone that  satisfied  all  hands  and  Waddles  wagged 
his  head  in  unison  with  the  picking  of  his  guitar 
and  hummed,  occasionally  accenting  the  air  with 
a  musical,  drumlike  boom.  They  rambled 
through  all  the  old  familiar  songs  of  the  range. 
The  Texan  herded  his  little  dogie  from  the 
Staked  Plains  to  Abilene;  the  herd  was  soothed 
on  the  old  bed  ground — bed  down  my  dogie,  bed 
down — and  the  poor  cowboy  was  many  times 
])uried  far  out  on  the  lone  prair-ee. 

Bangs  had  stationed  himself  so  that  he  could 
see  the  girl  and  throughout  the  evening  his  sur- 


8o  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

prised  eyes  never  once  strayed  from  Billie  War- 
ren's face. 

She  leaned  back  against  the  wagon  wheel,  en- 
joying it  all,  but  her  complacence  was  jarred  as 
she  half -turned  and  noted  Morrow's  face,  drawn 
and  bleak,  unsoftened  by  the  music.  Again  the 
feeling  of  dislike  for  him  rose  within  her;  but  he 
was  an  efficient  hand  and  she  had  nothing  definite 
against  him.  At  the  end  of  an  hour  Waddles 
rose  and  returned  his  instrument  to  the  wagon. 
The  group  broke  up  and  every  man  turned  in. 

Billie  Warren  lay  in  her  teepee,  her  mind 
busily  going  over  the  events  of  the  day.  The 
night  sounds  of  the  range  drifted  to  her.  A  bull- 
bat  rasped  a  note  or  two  from  above.  A  picketed 
horse  stamped  restlessly  just  outside  and  a  range 
cow  bawled  from  an  adjacent  slope.  The  night- 
hawk  had  relieved  the  wrangler  and  she  could 
half -hear,  half -feel  the  low  jar  of  many  hoofs  as 
he  grazed  the  remuda  slowly  up  the  valley,  sing- 
ing to  while  away  the  time. 

She  reflected  that  Cal  Harris  was  at  least  pos- 
sessed of  self-confidence  and  that  procrastination 
was  certainly  not  to  be  numbered  among  his  fail- 
ings. It  came  to  her  that  his  interests,  for  the 
present,  were  identical  with  her  own.  As  half- 
owner  in  the  Three  Bar  it  would  be  as  much  to  his 
advantage  as  to  her  own  to  build  it  up.  Wad- 
dles's  warped  legs  prevented  his  acting  as  fore- 
man on  the  job  and  it  might  be  that  the  other  man 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  81 

would  find  some  way  to  prevent  the  leak  that  was 
sapping  the  life  from  the  Three  Bar.  His  half- 
ownership  entitled  him  to  the  place.  Billie  War- 
ren loved  her  brand  and  her  personal  distrust  of 
Harris  was  submerged  in  the  hope  that  his  shar- 
ing the  full  responsibility  with  herself  might  be  a 
step  toward  putting  it  back  on  the  old-time  plane 
of  prosperity. 

The  jar  of  hoofs  had  ceased  and  she  knew  that 
the  remuda  had  bedded  down;  and  having  at  last 
reached  a  decision  she  fell  asleep  with  the  croon- 
ing voice  of  the  nighthawk  drifting  to  her  ears. 


It  seemed  but  a  few  fleeting  moments  before 
Waddles's  voice  roused  her. 

"Roll  out!"  he  bawled.  "Feet  in  the 
trough ! " 

There  was  instant  activity,  the  jingle  of  belts 
and  spurs  and  in  five  minutes  every  man  was 
fully  clothed  and  splashing  at  the  creek.  It  was 
showing  rose  and  gray  in  the  east  when  the  meal 
was  finished  and  the  cook's  voice  was  once  more 
raised. 

"All  set!  Ru-un-n  'em  in!"  he  called,  and 
there  came  the  rumble  of  hoofs  as  the  nighthawk 
acted  on  this  order  and  headed  the  remuda  to- 
ward the  wagon.  Two  men  mounted  the  horses 
that  had  been  picketed  close  at  hand  throughout 
the  night  and  stationed  themselves  on  either  side 
of  the  open  end  of  the  rope  corral  to  guide  the 
horse  herd  into  it. 

The  horses  could  not  be  seen  until  almost  upon 
them,  looming  suddenly  out  of  the  dim  gray  of 
early  morning  and  surging  into  the  corral.  The 
nighthawk  and  the  two  men  already  mounted 
rode  around  it,  driving  back  any  horse  that 
showed  a  disposition  to  leave  the  corral  by  a 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         83 

downward  slash  of  a  doubled  rope  across  his 
face  and  ears.  The  man  went  in  and  scattered 
through  the  milling  herd,  each  one  watching  his 
chance  to  put  his  noose  on  a  circle  horse  of  his 
own  string. 

When  most  of  the  men  were  mounted  Billie 
urged  Papoose  over  near  Harris's  horse. 

"Do  you  know  how, to  throw  a  circle?"  she 
asked. 

"After  a  fashion,"  he  said.  "  I've  bossed  one 
or  two  in  the  past." 

"  Then  we'd  better  be  off,"  she  suggested. 
"  Since  you're  the  Three  Bar  foreman  it's  for  you 
to  say  when." 

"  I  only  preempted  that  job  for  ten  minutes 
or  so,"  he  explained  with  evident  embarrassment. 
"  You  surely  didn't  think  I  was  trying  to  boost 
myself  into  the  foreman's  job  for  keeps?  " 

"  No,"  she  said.  "  But  you're  half-owner — 
and  you  can  handle  men.  I'm  giving  you  free 
rein  to  show  what  you  can  do." 

Harris  straightened  in  his  saddle  and  motioned 
to  the  men. 

"  Let's  go !  "  he  ordered,  and  headed  his  horse 
for  the  left-hand  flank  of  the  valley.  They  as- 
cended the  first  slopes,  picked  a  long  ridge  and 
followed  it  to  the  crest  of  the  low  divide  between 
that  valley  and  the  next. 

Harris  increased  the  pace  and  they  swept  up- 
country  along  the  divide  at  a  steady  lope.    When 


84  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

traveling  or  making  a  long  day's  ride  on  a  single 
horse  the  cowhand  saves  his  mount  and  travels 
always  at  a  trail-trot,  but  with  work  to  be  done, 
three  circles  to  be  thrown  in  a  day  and  with  a 
string  of  fresh  horses  for  every  hand,  the  para- 
mount issue  of  the  circle  is  the  saving  of  time 
rather  than  the  saving  of  mounts.  As  they 
reached  the  head  of  the  first  draw  that  led  back 
down  into  the  valley  Harris  waved  an  arm. 

"  Carp,"  he  called,  and  a  middle-aged  man 
named  Carpenter,  abbreviated  to  Carp,  wheeled 
his  horse  from  the  group  and  headed  doAvn  the 
draw. 

A  half-mile  farther  on  they  reached  the  head 
of  another  gulch. 

"  Hanson! "  the  new  foreman  called,  and  the 
man  who  repped  for  the  Halfmoon  D  dropped 
out.  One  man  was  detailed  to  work  each  draw 
and  when  some  five  miles  up  the  divide  there  were 
but  half  the  crew  left.  Harris  dropped  down  a 
long  ridge  and  crossed  the  bottoms.  Far  down 
the  valley  the  wagon  showed  through  the  thin, 
clear  air.  The  foreman  led  the  way  to  the  oppo- 
site divide  and  doubled  back,  sending  a  man  down 
every  gulch. 

The  girl  rode  with  him.  Down  in  the  bottoms 
they  could  see  the  riders  detailed  on  the  opposite 
side  hazing  the  cows  out  of  their  respective  draws 
and  heading  them  toward  the  wagon.  The  first 
few  men  left  their  cows  in  the  flat  and  veered 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         85 

past  them  to  station  themselves  near  the  wagon 
and  block  the  valley,  sitting  their  horses  at  hun- 
dred-yard intervals  across  it. 

Harris  and  the  girl  worked  the  last  draw  them- 
selves and  when  they  drove  their  cows  out  of  the 
mouth  of  it  they  found  a  herd  already  milled,  two 
hundred  yards  above  the  wagon.  Harris  left  her 
and  circled  the  bunch,  estimating  it. 

A  few  belated  riders  were  bringing  their 
quotas  to  swell  the  herds.  Frequently  a  bunch 
of  cows  made  a  break  to  leave  and  many  were  al- 
lowed to  make  good  their  escape  to  the  safety  of 
the  broken  slopes.  But  these  were  only  marked 
stuff  previously  branded  and  any  attempt  includ- 
ing a  cow  with  an  unbranded  calf  was  instantly 
blocked.  Each  rider  noted  the  brands  of  any 
cows  which  he  let  escape  and  more  particularly 
still  he  scanned  them  with  an  eye  for  the  presence 
of  a  "  slick,"  an  animal  missed  in  previous  round- 
ups and  wearing  no  brand.  Slick  cows  were  fair 
prey  for  any  man  who  first  put  his  rope  on  them 
and  he  was  entitled  to  run  his  own  brand  on  a 
slick  or  to  mark  it  with  the  brand  for  which  he 
rode  and  draw  down  a  certain  scale  of  premiums 
at  the  end  of  the  round-up  season. 

Harris  changed  mounts,  throwing  his  saddle 
on  the  paint-horse.  When  the  last  rider  ap- 
peared with  his  bunch  and  threw  it  into  the  herd 
Harris  signaled  all  hands  to  change  mounts. 
Half  the  men  repaired  to  the  rope  corral  and 


86         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

caught  up  cow  horses  while  the  balance  of  the 
crew  held  the  herd,  each  one  relieving  some  other 
as  soon  as  he  had  saddled  a  fresh  horse. 

When  the  hands  commenced  working  the  herd 
the  Three  Bar  girl  watched  the  trained  cow  horses 
with  an  interest  that  was  always  fresh,  for  from 
long  experience  they  thoroughly  understood 
every  move  of  the  game. 

A  sagebrush  fire  was  burning  fifty  yards  above 
the  wagon  and  each  man  rode  past  it,  leaned  from 
his  saddle  and  dropped  his  running  iron  in  the 
flame. 

The  men  worked  round  the  edge  of  the  bunch 
and  slipped  a  noose  on  every  calf  that  was  thrown 
to  the  edge  of  the  constantly  shifting  mass. 
Morrow  roped  the  first  calf  and  dragged  it  to  the 
fire.  A  cow  darted  away  with  her  calf  and 
Bangs's  horse  whirled  to  head  her  back.  As 
Bangs  shook  out  his  rope  the  horse  changed  tac- 
tics and  abandoned  the  course  that  would  have 
carried  him  past  to  turn  them,  following  in  close 
behind  them  instead.  After  two  preliminary 
swings  Bangs  made  his  throw  and  missed.  The 
horse  did  not  miss  a  step  but  kept  on  close  behind 
the  calf  while  his  rider  coiled  the  rope.  The 
second  throw  fell  fair  and  the  horse  set  his  feet 
and  braced  himself  as  the  calf  hit  the  end  of  the 
rope. 

As  much  as  she  loved  the  round-up,  many 
times  as  she  had  seen  it,  Billie  Warren  had  never 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  87 

become  calloused  to  the  brutalities  perpetrated 
on  the  calves.  She  withdrew  and  sat  in  the  shade 
of  the  wagon.  She  was  downwind  and  the  dust 
raised  by  the  trampling  hoofs  floated  down  to 
her,  mingled  with  the  odor  of  steaming  cows,  the 
acrid  smoke  of  the  sage  fire  and  the  taint  of 
scorched  hair  and  flesh. 

Some  of  the  men  handled  their  hot  irons  with 
makeshift  tongs  of  split  sage,  which  were  soon 
burnt  through  and  replaced.  Others  used  slen- 
der, long-handled  pliers  for  the  work. 

The  horses  held  the  calves  helpless,  moving 
just  enough  to  keep  the  ropes  taut.  Evans 
loosed  a  fresh-branded  calf  and  rode  over  to  the 
wagon  for  a  drink.  Several  cows  raced  wildly 
round  at  a  distance  from  the  fire. 

"  One  of  those  old  sisters  will  go  on  the  prod 
and  make  a  break  for  some  one  right  soon,"  he 
predicted  to  the  girl. 

A  calf  bawled  in  pain  and  a  cow,  maddened  by 
the  appeal  of  her  offspring,  charged  the  group 
around  the  fire.  The  horses  that  stood  there, 
holding  calves,  pricked  their  ears  and  watched  her 
rush  alertly  but  before  it  was  necessary  for  any 
one  of  them  to  dodge,  Slade's  rep  slipped  his  rope 
on  her,  jumped  his  horse  off  at  an  angle  and 
brought  her  down. 

Evans  pointed  to  where  Harris,  seated  on  the 
big  pinto,  was  working  slowly  through  the  center 
of  the  herd. 


88  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  He's  gone  in  after  another  slick,"  Evans  said. 
"  Watch  the  paint-horse  work." 

Calico  was  moving  after  the  animal  Harris 
wanted,  working  easily  and  without  a  single 
sharp  rush  that  would  cause  undue  disturbance 
among  the  cows. 

"A  good  cow  horse  is  like  a  hound,"  Lanky 
observed.  "  Let  him  spot  the  critter  you're 
wanting  and  nothing  can  shake  him  off." 

Calico  followed  a  serpentine  course  through 
the  mass,  crowded  a  three-year-old  to  the  edge 
and  cut  him  out.  The  animal  attempted  to 
dodge  back  among  his  fellows  but  the  paint-horse 
turned  as  on  a  pivot  and  blocked  him,  then  started 
him  off  in  a  straightaway  run. 

"  There's  a  real  rope-horse,"  Lanky  said. 
"  I've  been  noticing  him  work.     Look!  " 

Calico  had  braced  himself  as  the  slick  was 
roped,  shoving  his  hind  feet  out  ahead,  squatting 
on  his  haunches  and  raising  his  forefeet  almost 
clear  of  the  ground. 

"  Cal  broke  him  without  shoes  in  front,"  Evans 
explained.  "  His  feet  got  tender  after  he'd 
jerked  a  steer  or  two  and  he  learned  to  sock  his 
hind  feet  ahead  and  take  the  jar  on  them.  He'll 
last  two  years  longer  that  way.  A  horse  that 
takes  all  the  weight  on  his  front  feet  in  jerking 
heavy  stuff  soon  gets  stove  up  in  the  shoulders 
and  has  to  be  condemned.  This  Cal  Harris  has 
one  whole  bagful  of  knowing  tricks." 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         89 

He  rode  back  to  the  work  after  this  endorse- 
ment of  her  choice  of  a  foreman. 

Through  all  the  turmoil  the  nighthawk  slept 
peacefully  in  the  shade  of  a  sage-clump.  Wad- 
dles dozed  in  the  wagon  but  suddenly  came  to  life 
with  a  start  and  signaled  to  the  wrangler  who,  in 
his  turn,  waved  an  arm  to  the  man  nearest  him. 
The  four  wagon  horses  were  roped  and  harnessed 
while  Waddles  loaded  the  bed  rolls  on  the  tail- 
gate and  lashed  them  fast.  The  rope  corral  was 
dismantled  and  loaded.  The  chuck  wagon  veered 
past  the  herd  and  lumbered  up  the  valley  and  the 
wrangler  and  one  other  followed  with  the  horse 
herd. 

In  a  short  space  of  time  the  herd  had  been 
worked,  the  last  calf  branded,  and  Harris  led  the 
men  up  the  bottoms.  As  they  rode  each  one  re- 
ported the  brands  of  all  stock  which  he  had  let 
break  away  from  his  bunch  before  reaching  the 
herd.  Each  rep  entered  the  number  and  kind  of 
his  own  brand  so  reported  to  the  former  tally 
taken  of  the  herd. 

Five  miles  up  the  valley,  at  the  spot  where 
Harris  had  crossed  it  a  few  hours  before,  they 
found  the  wagon  waiting  at  the  new  stand,  the 
(!orral  refashioned  and  the  remuda  inside  it.  It 
was  but  ten  o'clock  but  the  first  circle  had  com- 
menced at  four.  The  noon  meal  on  the  round-up 
was  served  whenever  the  first  circle  was  com- 
pleted.   The  men  fell  ravenously  on  the  hot  meal. 


go         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

changed  to  fresh  circle  horses  and  started 
again. 

It  was  falling  dusk  when  the  herd  gathered  in 
the  third  circle  had  been  worked  and  the  last  calf 
branded  for  the  day.  The  men  had  unsaddled 
and  spread  their  bed  rolls  before  Waddles  had 
announced  the  meal.  The  nighthawk  came  rid- 
ing up  on  the  horse  he  had  picketed  prior  to  going 
to  sleep  before  sunup  at  the  first  stand.  His 
bed  roll  was  lashed  on  a  half -wild  range  horse  he 
had  roped  and  it  sagged  to  one  side,  having  no 
pack  saddle  to  keep  it  from  slipping,  and  he  spoke 
in  no  gentle  terms  of  an  outfit  that  would  pvill  out 
without  troubling  to  throw  his  pack  saddle  from 
the  wagon  or  taking  pains  to  picket  an  extra 
horse.  His  fretfulness  passed,  however,  as  he 
smelled  the  hot  coffee  and  he  repaired  to  the 
wagon,  his  ill  humor  dissipated. 

There  was  no  music  that  night,  every  man  re- 
tiring to  his  bed  roll  the  instant  he  finished  his 
meal. 

At  the  end  of  the  first  week  out  from  the  ranch 
Harris  pulled  up  his  horse  beside  the  girl's  and 
showed  her  his  tally  book. 

"  We've  run  Slade's  mark  on  more  calves  than 
we  have  our  own,"  he  said.  "  That's  one  way  he 
works." 

"  But  that's  not  his  fault  and  it  doesn't  mean 
anything,"  she  said.  "  His  cows  are  sure  to 
drift.     This  first  strip  we've  worked  is  the  south- 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         91 

ernmost  edge  of  our  range  and  his  north  wagon 
works  the  strip  right  south  of  us.  We're  sure  to 
find  a  number  of  his  cows.  As  we  double  back 
on  our  next  lap  we'll  not  find  the  same  propor- 
tion." 

"  Not  quite  —  but  plenty,"  he  predicted. 
'*  We've  marked  more  calves  for  Slade  in  one 
week  than  all  his  three  wagon  crews  will  mark 
for  the  Three  Bar  in  a  year.  The  first  three 
weeks  of  each  season  your  men  do  a  little  more 
work  for  Slade  than  they  do  for  you.  It's  a  safe 
bet  that  the  Halfmoon  D  does  the  same,  and  so 
on  through  every  brand  that  joins  his  range. 
That  puts  him  way  off  ahead." 

"  But  that  is  pure  accident,"  she  said. 

"  It's  pure  design,"  he  stated.  "  His  boys  are 
busy  shoving  his  cows  from  the  middle  all  ways 
so  that  when  fall  comes  he  has  a  good  inside  block 
that's  only  been  lightly  fed  over.  They  fall  back 
on  that  for  winter  feed.  Last  winter,  when  cows 
were  dying  like  rats,  his  men  were  out  drifting 
Slade's  stuff  back  toward  his  middle  range." 

"  That's  true  enough,"  she  admitted. 
^^But " 

"  But  you  thought  he  was  doing  it  as  a  favor 
to  you — getting  his  surplus  off  your  territory  so 
your  own  cows  would  have  a  better  chance. 
That's  the  same  kind  of  talk  he  floated  all  round 
the  line ;  playing  the  benevolent  neighbor  when  in 
reality  the  old  pirate  had  deliberately  planned. 


92         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

year  after  year,  to  overcrowd  your  range  and  feed 
you  out." 

"  But  his  men  would  know,"  she  objected. 
.  "  Not  many  of  them  would  grasp  the  whole 
scheme  of  it,"  he  said.  "  You  hadn't  thought  of 
it  yourself.  He'd  detail  a  pair  of  boys  to  shove  a 
few  hundred  head  way  off  to  the  south.  A  few 
days  later  another  couple  would  be  throwing  a 
bunch  off  northeast.  See?  And  what  if  a  few 
of  them  did  surmise?  They're  riding  for  his 
brand." 

The  girl  nodded.  That  unalterable  code 
again, — the  religion  of  being  loyal  to  one's  brand. 
Not  one  of  Slade's  men  would  balk  at  doing  it 
knowingly;  each  would  do  anything  to  advance 
his  interests  as  long  as  he  drew  his  pay  from 
Slade. 

"  I  doubt  if  there's  a  dozen  men  within  two 
himdred  miles  that  haven't  lifted  a  few  calves 
now  and  then  for  the  brand  they  were  riding  for. 
That's  the  way  it  goes.  A  rule  that  was  fine  to 
start — loyalty  to  the  hand  that  paid  you;  then 
carried  too  far  until  it's  degenerated  into  a  tool 
that's  often  abused,"  he  said. 

As  they  talked  Harris  detailed  men  for  each 
draw  but  when  they  reached  the  point  where  they 
were  due  to  drop  down  and  cross  the  valley  he 
pulled  up  his  horse. 

"  You  take  the  rest  of  the  circle.  Carp,"  he  in- 
structed Carpenter.     "  I'm  going  to  ride  off  up 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         93 

the  ridge  a  piece."  The  girl  regarded  him  curi- 
ously. No  less  than  three  times  in  the  last  week 
he  had  stopped  midway  of  the  circle  and  asked 
her  to  complete  it.  Now  he  had  turned  it  over 
to  Carp  and  he  signaled  her  to  remain  with 
liim. 

"  Where  are  we  going? "  she  asked  as  she 
^vatched  the  men  ride  down  toward  the  bottoms. 
"And  why? " 

"  Back  the  way  we  came,"  he  said.  "  And 
maybe  I  can  show  you  why." 

He  headed  back  the  divide  they  had  just  fol- 
lowed until  he  came  to  the  saddle  at  the  head  of  a 
draw  that  led  down  to  the  valley.  Far  below 
them  they  could  see  a  rider  hazing  a  bunch  of 
cows  out  into  the  bottoms.  High  on  the  right- 
hand  slope  of  the  gulch  lay  a  notch,  a  little  blind 
basin  watered  by  the  seepage  from  a  sidehill 
spring,  and  there  on  the  green  bed  of  it  a  dozen 
cows  with  their  calves  grazed  undisturbed.  For 
perhaps  five  minutes  Harris  lolled  sidewise  in  the 
saddle  and  watched  them.  Then  a  rider  ap- 
]ieared  on  the  ridge  that  divided  that  draw  from 
the  next,  dropped  in  below  the  cows  and  headed 
them  back  over  the  ridge  into  the  draw  from 
^vhich  he  had  appeared.  Even  at  that  distance 
she  recognized  this  last  man  as  Lanky  Evans. 
Harris  resumed  his  way  down  the  divide  and  she 
knew  that  he  had  discovered  some  irregularity  for 
which  he  had  been  seeking. 


94         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  Who  was  the  man  that  overlooked  those 
cows?  "  she  asked.     "  Who  worked  that  draw?  " 

"  Morrow,"  he  said.  "  His  eyesight  is  getting 
bad.  That's  the  second  time  this  week — and  the 
last.  IVe  detailed  Lanky  to  work  the  gulch 
next  to  him  every  circle  so  that  he  could  drop  over 
the  ridge  and  see  what  was  going  on.  That's 
why  he's  always  late  coming  in — ^not  because  he's 
lazy  but  because  he's  been  worknig  almost  a 
double  shift." 

"  Then  Morrow  is  an  inside  man  for  Harper," 
she  said.  "  Drawing  Three  Bar  pay  and  work- 
ing against  us  too." 

"  Yes,"  he  said.  "  Only  he's  an  inside  man  for 
Slade." 

"  But  how  could  his  leaving  those  calves  behind 
benefit  Slade?  "  she  demanded. 

"  How  could  it  benefit  Harper? "  he  coun- 
tered.    "  Can  you  tell  me  that?  " 

She  could  not  and  motioned  for  him  to  go  on. 

"  None  of  Harper's  men  has  a  brand  of  his 
own,"  he  said.  "  They're  living  on  the  move. 
They  can't  wait  for  calves  to  grow  up.  The  way 
they  work  is  to  run  a  bunch  of  beef  steers  across 
into  Idaho.  They'll  pick  up  another  bunch  there 
and  shove  them  across  the  Utah  line  and  repeat 
by  moving  a  drove  of  some  Utah  brand  up  in 
here.  Only  beef  steers — quick  turning  stuff. 
You  know  about  the  reputation  of  the  O  V  and 
the  Lazy  H  Four." 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         95 

She  knew  all  too  well.  There  was  a  half -feud, 
a  smoldering  distinist  displayed  between  cowmen 
on  each  side  of  the  three  State  lines,  a  triangle  of 
ill  feeling.  It  was  current  rumor  that  the  O  V 
and  the  Lazy  H  Four,  ranging  far  southwest  of 
the  Three  Bar,  would  traffic  in  any  steers  that 
came  from  across  either  the  Utah  or  Idaho  line. 
In  the  corner  of  those  States  were  similar  outfits 
that  were  receiving  stations  for  rustled  stock 
from  the  opposite  sides.  But  they  were  good 
neighbors  and  kept  hands  off  so  far  as  brands  on 
their  home  range  were  concerned.  It  was  part 
of  the  game,  and  as  long  as  their  own  interests 
were  not  disturbed  the  adjacent  outfits  were  blind. 
The  triangular  feud  had  been  fostered  to  a  point 
where  the  thieves  were  immune.  Even  if  a  di- 
rect complaint  should  be  brought  against  them 
they  had  but  to  ride  across  into  another  State  and 
a  sheriff  following  them  would  be  helpless,  the 
inhabitants  resenting  this  intrusion  into  their  af- 
fairs by  an  officer  from  another  State,  truly  hav- 
ing no  right  there,  and  refusing  to  aid  him  even  if 
they  did  not  actually  oppose  his  passage. 

"But  how  would  it  benefit  Slade?"  she  re- 
peated. 

"  Why,  suppose  that  Morrow  overlooked  a 
nice  bunch  of  Three  Bar  calves  all  along  this 
jirst  strip  next  to  Slade's  range,"  Harris  said. 
"  Then  some  Slade  rider  happens  to  drop  along 
after  our  wagon  has  moved  on  and  he  hazes  them 


96         The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

off  south.  Later  another  picks  them  up  and 
shoves  them  along  another  half -day's  drive — ^way 
beyond  where  our  boys  ever  work,  even  beyond 
the  strip  covered  by  Blade's  north  wagon,  the 
only  one  that  carries  a  Three  Bar  rep;  what 
then?" 

"  The  calves  would  still  be  with  mothers  wear- 
ing the  Three  Bar  mark,"  she  said.  "After  they 
leave  the  cows  they're  slicks,  fair  game  for  the 
first  man  that  puts  his  rope  on  them — and  Slade 
wouldn't  risk  running  one  of  his  own  brands  on 
them  before  they  left  the  cows." 

"  Not  one  of  his  own,  no,"  Harris  said;  "  only 
one  that's  going  to  be  his  later  on.  Did  it  ever 
strike  you  as  queer  that  Slade,  whose  way  is  to 
crush  every  new  outfit,  should  suffer  a  soft- 
I^earted  streak  every  year  or  so  and  befriend  some 
party  that  had  elected  to  start  up  for  himself 
right  in  the  middle  of  Slade's  range?  And  later 
buy  him  out?  That's  the  way  he  came  into  nearly 
every  brand  he  runs." 

"  He's  impulsive  in  his  friendships,"  she  de- 
fended.    "  He  has  always  been  like  that." 

"And  his  impulses  embrace  some  right  queer 
folks,"  Harris  remarked.  "  Several  of  those 
dinky  little  owners  have  moved  out  right  sudden 
with  a  dozen  riders  from  some  other  outfit  fan- 
ning  along  close  behind;  McArthur  didn't  even 
get  moved,  for  the  Brandons  went  on  the  war 
trail  before  he  had  time  to  start.     But  it  trans- 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         97 

pired  that  he  was  all  set  to  go  because  Slade 
showed  bill  of  sale  for  Mac's  holdings,  dated  only 
the  day  before.  That's  how  he  came  to  own 
every  one  of  those  brands  that  match  up  so  close 
with  those  of  every  outfit  that  overlaps  his 
range." 

"  But  if  he  actually  dealt  with  so  many  as 
you  believe,  some  one  of  them  would  be  sure 
to  have  trouble  later  on  and  tell  of  it,"  she 
argued. 

"And  it  would  be  the  word  of  a  self-confessed 
thief  against  that  of  the  biggest  owner  within  two 
hundred  miles,  and  Slade  would  laugh  at  him — 
or  kill  him,  according  to  whatever  mood  he  hap- 
pened to  be  in." 

They  had  turned  their  horses  down  a  long 
ridge  that  led  to  the  wagon  in  the  bottoms. 

"  I'll  mention  to  the  boys  that  Morrow  sold  out 
the  interests  of  the  Three  Bar  while  he  was  draw- 
ing down  your  pay.  They'll  pass  sentence  on 
him  right  sudden.  Four  hours  from  now  they'll 
have  dry-gulched  him  so  far  from  nowhere  that 
even  the  coyotes  can't  find  him." 

"  Not  that,"  she  said.  "  Turn  him  over  to  the 
sheriff.     You  caught  him  in  the  act." 

"  In  the  act  of  missing  a  few  cows  on  his  detail. 
The  sheriff  would  hold  him  almost  an  hour  before 
he  let  him  go." 

"  Then  give  him  his  check  and  send  him  off  the 
Three  Bar  range,"  she  said. 


gS  The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

Harris  waited  till  the  herd  had  been  worked 
and  the  men  had  gathered  round  the  wagon. 
Then  he  handed  Morrow  a  check. 

"  Here's  your  time,"  he  said.  **  You  can  be 
leaving  almost  any  time  now." 

Every  man  knew  that  Morrow  had  been  caught 
at  some  piece  of  work  contrary  to  the  interests  of 
the  Three  Bar.  The  discharged  hand  gave  a 
short  ugly  laugh. 

"As  soon  as  you  pussyfooted  into  the  fore- 
man's job  I  knew  it  was  only  a  question  of  time," 
he  said. 

"  Exactly,"  Harris  returned.  "  Pack  your 
stuff." 

"A  foreman  has  a  scattering  of  a  dozen  or  so 
men  to  back  him  up,"  Morrow  observed  with  a 
shrug  of  one  shoulder  toward  the  rest  of  the  men. 

Harris  turned  to  the  girl. 

"  I  resign  for  about  sixty  seconds,"  he  said  and 
swung  back  toward  Morrow ;  and  again  all  hands 
noted  his  queer  quartering  stand.  "  I'm  not 
foreman  right  at  this  minute,"  he  said.  "  So  if 
you  had  anything  in  particular  to  address  to  me 
in  a  personal  vein  you  can  start  now.  Otherwise 
you'd  better  be  packing  your  stuff." 

Morrow  turned  his  back  and  headed  for  the 
rope  corral.  When  he  had  saddled  one  horse 
and  packed  his  effects  on  another  he  turned  to 
Evans. , 

"  You  helped  frame  this  on  me,"  he  said.     "  I 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage         99 

thought  I  saw  you  messing  over  into  my  detail  a 
few  days  back." 

"  Right  on  the  first  ballot,"  Lanky  assented. 
"  I'm  only  riding  for  one  brand  at  a  time." 

"  One  day  right  soon  I'll  run  across  you  again," 
Morrow  prophesied. 

"  Then  I'll  take  to  riding  with  my  head  over 
my  shoulder — surveying  my  back-track,"  Lanky 
promised.  "  Because  we'll  most  likely  meet 
from  behind." 

For  the  first  time  Morrow's  bleak  face  changed 
expression,  the  lines  deepening  from  the  strain  of 
holding  himself  steady  in  the  face  of  the  con- 
temptuous insults  with  which  Lanky  casually  re- 
plied to  his  threats. 

He  started  to  snarl  an  answer,  his  usual  self- 
repression  deserting  him,  but  Harris  waved  an 
impatient  hand. 

"  Drag  it!  "  he  snapped.  "  Get  moving.  If 
I  had  my  own  way  we'd  lead  your  horse  out  from 
under  you — and  we  will  if  I  ever  hear  of  your 
turning  up  on  the  Three  Bar  range  again." 


VI 

BiLLiE  Warren  rode  with  Harris  on  the  last 
kp  of  the  circle.  There  were  but  two  'men  re- 
maining with  them. 

"  Moore!  "  Harris  called,  and  the  man  turned 
his  horse  down  the  head  of  a  draw  that  would  lead 
him  out  into  the  bottoms  a  trifle  less  than  a  mile 
above  the  wagon.  Harris  heard  a  shrill  whistle 
behind  him  and  turned  sidewise  in  the  saddle  to 
look  back,  saw  that  Moore  had  regained  the  ridge 
and  was  signaling.     They  turned  and  rode  back 

to  him.  <5EO.  A.  WHEELER 

"  There's  another,"  Moore  said,  pointing  down 
the  gulch.     "  It's  getting  to  be  a  habit." 

A  dead  cow  lay  on  a  little  flat  a  hundred  yards 
below.  For  three  consecutive  days  some  rider 
had  found  a  fresh-killed  Three  Bar  cow.  Every 
animal  had  been  shot. 

"  I'll  look  this  one  over  myself,"  Harris  de- 
cided. "  There's  only  two  more  gulches  to  work. 
Each  one  of  you  boys  take  one." 

The  girl  followed  him  as  he  turned  down  the 
first  steep  pitch.  They  pulled  up  their  horses 
and  sat  looking  at  the  cow.  A  trickle  of  blood 
oozed  out  of  a  hole  between  her  eyes.  Harris 
rode  in  a  circle  round  the  spot. 

"  He  downed  her  from  some  point  above,"  he 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        loi 

said.  "  Not  a  sign  anywhere  close  at  hand."  He 
surveyed  the  ridges  that  flanked  either  side  of  the 
draw  and  the  little  saddle-like  depression  at  the 
head  of  it  from  which  they  had  just  descended. 
From  beyond  this  gap  came  the  shrill  nicker  of  a 
horse,  the  sound  chopped  short  as  if  a  man  had 
clamped  his  hand  on  the  animal's  nostrils  to  si- 
lence it.     Harris  turned  swiftly  to  the  girl. 

"  It's  a  plant,"  he  said.     "  Ride— hard!  " 

He  suited  his  action  to  the  words  and  jumped 
his  horse  off  down  the  bottoms.  He  waved  her 
over  to  one  side. 

"Keep  well  away  from  me!"  he  ordered. 
"  They  don't  want  you." 

They  hung  their  spurs  into  their  mounts  and 
the  horses  plunged  down  the  steeply-pitching 
bottoms,  vaulting  sage  clumps  and  bounding 
along  the  cow  trails  that  threaded  the  brush. 
Two  hundred  yards  below  the  cow  the  draw  made 
an  elbow  bend.  The  girl  rounded  it  and  as  Har- 
ris followed  a  jump  behind  he  felt  a  jarring  tug 
at  the  cantle  of  his  saddle  and  the  thin,  sharp 
crack  of  a  rifle  reached  him.  The  gulch  made  a 
reverse  bend  and  as  they  swept  around  it  Harris 
swung  sidewise  in  the  saddle  and  looked  back. 
They  were  entirely  sheltered  from  any  point  on 
the  divide  six  hundred  yards  behind  them.  He 
pulled  his  horse  to  a  swinging  trot  and  they  rode 
down  the  sloping  meadow  that  led  straight  to  the 
main  valley. 


102        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  It  was  certainly  stupid  of  me  not  to  know 
right  off  that  it  was  a  decoj'-,"  he  said.  "A  man 
just  out  to  act  spiteful  would  have  piled  up  a 
dozen  cows  at  one  stand  and  left.  He's  downed 
one  every  day — in  plain  sight  of  the  divide  we'd 
follow  on  the  circle,  knowing  that  I'd  soon  ride 
do^vn  to  look  one  over  myself.  All  he  had  to  do 
was  to  cache  himself  on  the  far  side,  watch  for  me 
to  ride  down,  wait  until  the  rest  had  gone  on  and 
climb  to  the  divide  and  pot  me.  And  it  would 
have  been  so  dead  easy  to  turn  the  tables  and 
bushwhack  him,"  he  added  regretfully.  "  If 
only  I'd  have  used  my  head  in  time." 

A  sick  chill  swept  the  girl  as  she  thought  of  an 
enemy  with  the  patience  to  kill  a  cow  every  day, 
use  it  for  a  decoy  and  wait  for  a  chance  at  his 
human  prey. 

The  cows  that  grazed  on  the  meadow  raced  off 
ahead  of  them.  A  bunch  of  wild  range  horses 
swept  up  the  broken  slopes  and  wheeled  to  watch 
them  pass. 

"  We  didn't  get  started  any  too  soon,"  Harris 
said.  "  His  horse  wasn't  more  than  a  hundred 
feet  beyond  the  notch  when  he  blew  off  and 
warned  us — ^not  time  for  me  to  get  cached  and 
drop  him  as  he  topped  the  ridge." 

The  girl's  eyes  suddenly  riveted  on  a  small 
round  hole  in  the  cantle  of  his  saddle  where  the 
ball  had  entered.  On  the  inside  and  far  to  the 
left  extremity  of  the  cantle  a  ragged  gash  showed 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        103 

where  it  had  passed  out.  The  shot  had  been  fired 
as  he  wheeled  round  the  sharp  bend,  quartering 
away  from  the  man  above,  but  even  then  the  ball 
had  not  missed  his  left  hip  to  exceed  an  inch. 

She  started  her  horse  so  suddenly  that  before 
he  realized  her  purpose  she  was  well  in  the  lead 
and  going  at  a  dead  run  toward  the  mouth  of  the 
gulch  where  it  opened  out  into  the  main  bottoms 
two  hundred  yards  beyond. 

From  the  opposite  slope  riders  were  hazing 
cows  out  of  their  respective  draws;  some  had 
reached  the  wagon;  others  were  coming  down 
from  above.  The  running  horse  caught  every 
man's  eye  as  the  girl  careened  out  into  the  center 
of  the  valley,  rose  in  her  stirrups  and  waved  an 
arm  in  a  circle  above  her  head.  In  five  seconds 
riders  were  whirling  in  behind  her  from  all  direc- 
tions as  she  headed  for  the  wagon. 

She  waved  those  already  on  the  spot  toward 
the  rope  corral. 

"  Change  horses !  "  she  called,  and  as  each  man 
rode  in  he  caught  up  a  fresh  horse. 

"  Scatter  out;  some  of  you  below  where  we 
came  down,  some  above,"  she  said.  "  Five  hun- 
dred to  the  man  that  brings  Morrow  in." 

"  It's  no  use,  Billie,"  Harris  counseled  mildly. 
''  He's  plum  out  of  the  country  by  now.  It'll  be 
dark  in  three  hours — and  it's  right  choppy  coun- 
try over  there." 

Waddles  interposed  and  seconded  her  move. 


104        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  Let  'em  rip,"  he  said.  "  There's  just  a 
chance." 

Bangs  was  the  first  to  change  mounts.  The 
boy's  physical  qualifications  were  as  sound  as  his 
mental  ability  was  limited  and  it  was  his  pride  to 
have  a  string  of  mounts  that  included  the  worst 
horses  in  the  lot.  He  rode  from  the  corral  on 
Blue,  holding  the  big  roan  steady,  and  headed  up 
the  ridge  a  mile  below  where  Harris  and  the  girl 
had  come  down.  Rile  Foster  chose  the  next ;  five 
riders  were  but  a  few  jumps  behind.  Harris  did 
not  change  horses  but  searched  hastily  in  his  war 
bag  and  slipped  the  strap  of  a  binocular  case 
across  his  shoulders  and  rode  off  with  the  girl  as 
she  finished  cinching  her  saddle  on  a  fresh  horse. 

In  less  than  five  minutes  from  the  time  she  had 
reached  the  wagon  the  last  Three  Bar  man  had 
mounted  and  gone.  Harris  rode  with  her  up  a 
long  ridge  that  led  up  to  the  divide;  they  followed 
another  into  the  next  bottoms  and  ascended  the 
second  divide.  This  was  sharp  and  rocky,  its 
crest  a  maze  of  ragged  pinnacles.  He  chose  the 
highest  of  these  and  dismounted  to  sweep  the 
range  with  his  glasses.  The  low  country  beyond 
them  was  broken  and  choppy,  a  succession  of  tiny 
box  canyons  and  rough  coulees.  Off  to  the  right 
he  made  out  Rile  Foster  working  through  the 
tangle.  Somewhere  beyond  him  Bangs  would 
be  doing  the  same.  Riders  came  into  view  off  to 
the  left,  crossing  some  ridge,  only  to  disappear 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        105 

once  more.  The  high  point  afforded  a  view  of 
every  ridge  for  miles.  After  perhaps  half  an 
hour  Harris  caught  five  horsemen  in  the  field  of 
his  glasses.     They  were  riding  in  a  knot. 

"  They've  picked  up  his  trail,"  he  said.  "  But 
he'll  have  too  long  a  lead.  He'll  be  fanning  right 
along  and  they'll  have  to  work  out  a  track.  In 
less  than  two  hours  it  will  be  dark — and  by  morn- 
ing he'll  be  forty  miles  from  here  and  up  on  a 
fresh  horse." 

He  rested  his  elbows  on  the  ground  to  steady 
the  glasses  as  he  trained  them  off  in  the  direction 
the  five  men  had  gone.  Twice  he  saw  them  cross 
over  ridges.  Then  a  tiny,  swift-moving  speck 
came  into  his  field  of  view,  traveling  up  the  slope 
of  a  distant  divide.  The  ant-like  rider  dipped 
over  the  crest  of  it  and  was  gone. 

"  He's  more  than  five  miles  in  the  lead  of 
them,"  he  said.  "  Across  rough  country  too. 
There  was  just  a  chance  that  he  Avould  work  back 
through  these  breaks  below  us  instead  of  making 
a  ride  for  it,  and  we  could  have  spotted  him  from 
up  here.    We  might  as  well  be  going." 

They  moimted  and  headed  to  the  right  along 
the  divide. 

"  If  Rile  is  in  sight  we  can  wait  for  him,"  he 
said.    "  And  see  if  he's  picked  up  any  tracks." 

A  half-mile  along  the  ridge  they  saw  Foster 
off  through  the  breaks  and  he  was  working  back 
their  way. 


io6        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  Thanks,  Billie,"  Harris  said.  "  For  losing  a 
circle  trying  to  run  him  down." 

"  I'd  have  done  as  much  for  any  Three  Bar 
man,"  she  returned. 

"  Of  course,"  he  said.  "  I'd  have  expected 
that.  But  all  the  same  I'd  hardly  looked  to  see 
you  show  much  concern  over  what  happened  to 
me." 

"  I  don't  want  to  see  even  you  shot  in  the 
back,"  she  said.    "  Is  that  answer  enough?  " 

"  It  shows  that  I'm  progressing,"  he  smiled. 
"  Maybe  my  good  qualities  will  grow  on  you  un- 
til you  get  to  thinking  right  well  of  me." 

They  waited  till  Foster  joined  them  on  the 
ridge. 

"  Bangs  crossed  over  a  mile  below,"  Rile  said. 
"  We  might  pick  him  up." 

"Any  sign?"  Harris  asked  as  they  moved 
down  the  divide. 

"  A  bunch  of  shod  horses  went  down  through 
there  a  few  days  back,"  Rile  said.  "  Three  or  four 
men  likely,  with  a  few  pack  horses  along.  There 
was  a  fresh  track,  made  this  morning,  going  up- 
country  alone.  He  likely  stayed  at  their  camp 
all  night,  wherever  it  is.  I  worked  across,  think- 
ing he  might  go  back  to  it ;  but  there  was  no  down 
trail.    He's  pulled  out." 

"  I  saw  him,"  Harris  said.    "  He's  gone." 

They  stopped  in  the  saddle  of  the  ridge  where 
a  fresh  track  showed  the  spot  Bangs  had  crossed. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        107 

The  girl  was  looking  at  Harris  and  saw  a  sud- 
den pallor  travel  up  under  his  tan  and  as  she 
turned  to  see  what  had  occasioned  it  he  crowded 
his  horse  against  her  own. 

"Don't  look!"  he  ordered,  and  forced  her 
horse  over  the  far  side  of  the  ridge.  **  You'd 
better  ride  on  back  to  the  wagon,"  he  urged. 
"  There's  been  some  sort  of  doings  over  across. 
Rile  and  I  will  ride  down  and  look  into  it." 
Without  a  word  she  turned  her  horse  toward  the 
wagon. 

"  It's  God's  mercy  she  didn't  see,"  Harris  said, 
as  the  two  crossed  back  over  the  ridge.  "  Isn't 
that  a  hell  of  a  way  for  a  man  to  die?  " 

But  the  girl  had  seen.  Her  one  brief  look  had 
revealed  a  horse  coming  round  a  bend  in  a  little 
box  canyon  below.  A  shapeless  thing  dragged 
from  one  stirrup  and  at  every  third  or  fourth 
jump  the  big  blue  horse  side-slashed  the  limp 
bundle  with  his  heels. 

As  the  two  men  reached  the  bottoms  the 
frenzied  horse  had  stopped  and  was  fighting  to 
free  himself  of  the  thing  that  followed  him.  He 
moved  away  from  it  in  a  circle  but  it  was  always 
with  him.  He  squealed  and  kicked  it,  then 
dashed  off  in  a  fresh  panic,  side-swiping  his  pur- 
suer. 

Harris's  rope  tightened  on  his  neck  and  threw 
him.  As  he  rolled  over  Foster's  noose  snared 
both  hind  feet  and  he  was  held  stretched  and 


io8        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

helpless  between  two  trained  cow  horses  while 
the  men  disengaged  the  bundle  that  had  once 
been  Bangs.  One  boot  heel  was  missing  and  his 
foot  was  jammed  through  the  stirrup,  evidence 
that  the  horse  had  pitched  with  him  and  the 
loosened  heel  had  come  off,  allowing  his  foot  to 
slip  through  as  he  was  thrown. 

Harris  pointed  to  a  burnt  red  streak  across  the 
right  side  of  Bangs's  neck.  He  unbuttoned  his 
shirt  and  revealed  a  similar  streak  under  his  left 
armpit. 

Old  Rile  cursed  horribly  and  his  face  seemed 
to  have  aged  ten  years. 

"  They  learned  that  from  the  albino,"  he  said. 
"  It's  an  old  trick  that  always  works.  They 
dropped  a  rope  on  him  and  jerked  him,  pried  off 
his  heel,  shoved  his  boot  through  and  laid  the  quirt 
on  his  horse.    Blue  did  the  rest." 

Both  men  knew  well  how  it  had  happened. 
Bangs  had  run  across  the  camp  of  some  of  the 
wild  bunch,  men  he  had  known  for  long,  and  the 
slow-thinking  youth  had  suspected  no  more  dan- 
ger from  riding  on  up  to  them  at  this  time  than 
at  any  other.  He  had  told  them  of  the  shot  fired 
at  Harris  and  they  had  known  that  some  other 
Three  Bar  man  would  find  the  trail  leading  from 
the  direction  of  their  camp.  And  Bangs  would 
mention  having  found  them  there,  linking  them 
with  the  bushwhacker. 

When  Bangs  had  left  a  pair  of  them  had  rid- 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        109 

den  a  distance  with  him  and  accomplished  their 
aim. 

"  It's  coming  dark,"  Harris  said.  "  And  by 
morning  they'll  be  thirty  miles  away.  That  sort 
of  a  killing  was  never  fastened  on  to  any  man 

yet." 

The  old  man  raised  a  doubled  fist  and  his  face 
was  lined  with  sorrow. 

"  Bangs  was  almost  a  son  to  me,"  he  said.  "  I 
taught  him  to  ride — and  we've  rode  together  on 
every  job  since  then.  You  hear  me!  Some  one 
is  going  to  die  for  this !  " 

It  was  an  hour  after  sundown  when  they 
reached  the  wagon  with  all  that  was  earthly  of 
Bangs  lashed  across  the  blue  horse  and  it  was 
midnight  before  the  five  men  who  had  followed 
the  trail  returned  with  the  word  that  they 
had  been  unable  to  even  sight  the  man  they 
tracked. 

During  the  next  week  the  girl  inwardly  ac- 
cused the  men  of  heartlessness.  They  jested  as 
carelessly  as  if  nothing  unusual  had  occurred  and 
she  heard  no  mention  of  Bangs.  It  seemed  that 
it  took  but  a  day  for  them  to  forget  a  former 
comrade  who  had  come  to  an  untimely  end.  Rile 
Foster  had  disappeared  but  on  the  fifth  day  he 
turned  up  at  the  Three  Bar  wagon  and  resumed 
his  work  without  the  least  explanation  of  his  ab- 
sence. 

The  old  man  was  gloomy  and  silent,  his  face  set 


110        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

in  sorrowful  lines  as  he  went  about  his  work,  and 
it  was  evident  that  he  was  continually  brooding 
over  the  fate  of  the  youth  he  had  loved.  It 
seemed  to  the  girl  that  the  men  were  even  more 
cheerful  and  thoughtless  than  usual,  that  they 
concerned  their  minds  with  every  conceivable 
topic  except  that  which  was  uppermost  in  her 
own.  The  death  of  Bangs  had  affected  them  not 
at  all. 

She  could  not  shake  off  the  remembrance  of  the 
boy's  adoring  gaze  as  his  eyes  had  followed  every 
move  she  made  and  in  some  vague  way  she  felt 
that  she  was  responsible  for  the  accident.  She 
often  rode  near  Rile  Foster,  knowing  what  was 
in  his  mind.  He  spoke  but  little  and,  in 
common  with  the  rest,  he  never  once  mentioned 
Bangs. 

At  the  end  of  a  week  Slade  rode  up  to  the 
wagon  as  the  men  were  working  the  cows  gath- 
ered in  the  second  circle  of  the  day.  He  jerked 
his  head  to  draw  her  aside  out  of  range  of  Wad- 
dles's  ears. 

"  How's  the  Three  Bar  showing  up  this 
spring?  "  he  asked  abruptly. 

"  Better  than  ever,"  she  retorted  and  he  caught 
a  note  of  defiance  in  her  voice. 

"  You're  lying,  Billie,"  he  asserted  calmly. 
"  The  Three  Bar  will  show  another  shrinkage  this 
year." 

"How  do  you  loiow?"  she  flashed;  and  the 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        1 1 1 

distrust  of  him  that  Harris  had  roused  in  her, 
lately  submerged  beneath  the  troubling  thoughts 
of  Bangs,  was  suddenly  quickened  and  thrown 
uppermost  in  her  mind.  In  gauging  him  from 
this  new  angle  she  sensed  a  ruthlessness  in  him 
that  was  not  confined  solely  to  business  efficiency ; 
he  would  crush  her  interests  without  a  quahn  if 
it  would  gain  his  end. 

"  I  know,"  he  asserted.  "  It's  my  business  to 
know  everything  that  goes  on  anywhere  near  my 
range.  There's  not  another  outfit  within  a  hun- 
dred miles  that's  on  the  increase.  They're  just 
hanging  on,  some  of  them  making  a  little,  some 
of  them  not.  You  say  you  want  to  run  the  Three 
Bar  brand  yourself.  There's  not  a  man  in  this 
country  that  would  touch  a  Three  Bar  cow  if  you 
was  hooked  up  with  me." 

"  And  then  the  Three  Bar  would  be  only  one 
out  of  a  dozen  or  more  Slade  brands,"  she  said. 
She  pointed  to  the  men  that  worked  with  the  mill- 
ing cows  in  the  flat.  "  That's  what  I  want,"  she 
said.  "  To  run  an  outfit  of  my  own — ^not  one 
of  yours." 

For  no  reason  at  all  she  was  suddenly  con- 
vinced of  the  truth  of  Harris's  suspicions  con- 
cerning Slade.  She  noted  that  his  eyes  traveled 
from  one  man  to  the  next  till  he  had  scrutinized 
every  one  that  worked  the  herd. 

"  Are  you  looking  for  Morrow? "  she  de- 
manded,  and   instantly  regretted  her  remark. 


112        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

Slade's  face  did  not  change  by  so  much  as  the 
bat  of  an  eye  and  he  failed  to  reply  for  a  space — 
too  long  a  space,  she  reflected — then  turned  to 
her. 

"  Morrow — who's  he? "  he  asked.  "  And  why 
should  I  look  for  him?  " 

"  He  rode  for  you  last  year,"  she  said. 

"  Oh!  That  fellow.  I  recall  him  now.  Bleak- 
looking  citizen,"  he  said.  "  And  what  about 
him?" 

**  You  tell  me,"  she  countered. 

"  That  new  foreman  of  yours — the  fellow  that 
was  scouting  round  alone  for  a  few  months — ^has 
been  talking  with  his  mouth,"  Slade  said.  "  If 
he  keeps  that  up  I'll  have  to  ask  him  to  speak 
right  out  what's  on  his  mind." 

"He'll  tell  you,"  she  prophesied.  "What 
then?" 

"  Then  I'll  kill  him,"  the  man  stated. 

The  girl  motioned  to  Lanky  Evans  and  he  rode 
across  to  them. 

"  Lanky,  I  want  you  to  remember  this,"  she 
said.  "  Slade  has  just  promised  to  kill  Harris. 
And  if  he  does  I'll  spend  every  dollar  I  own  see- 
ing that  he's  hung  for  it,"  she  turned  to  Slade. 
"  You  might  repeat  what  you  just  told  me,"  she 
suggested. 

Slade  looked  at  her  steadily. 

"  You  misunderstood  me,"  he  stated.  "  I 
don't  recall  any  remark  to  that  effect  or  even  to 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        1 13 

mentioning  the  name  of  Harris.  Who  is  he,  any- 
how? " 

Evans  slouched  easily  in  the  saddle  and 
twisted  a  smoke. 

"  Now  let's  get  this  straight  what  I'm  to  re- 
member," he  said.  "  Mr.  Slade  was  saying  that 
he  planned  to  down  Cal  Harris  the  first  time  he 
caught  him  out  alone.  I  heard  him  remark  to 
that  effect."  He  turned  and  grinned  cheerfully 
at  Slade.  "  That's  his  very  words — and  I'd 
swear  to  it  as  long  as  my  breath  held  out.  I'll 
sort  of  repeat  it  over  to  myself  so  that  I  can  give 
it  to  the  judge  word  for  word  when  the  time 
comes." 

Slade  favored  him  with  a  long  stare  which 
Lanky  bore  with  unconcern,  smiling  back  at  him 
pleasantly. 

**  I've  got  my  little  piece  memorized,"  Evans 
said;  "and  in  parting  let  me  remark  that  Cal 
Harris  will  prove  a  new  sort  of  a  victim  for  you 
to  work  on.  If  you  tie  into  him  he'll  tear  down 
your  meat-house."  He  turned  his  horse  and  rode 
back  to  the  herd. 

"  I'll  play  your  own  game,"  the  girl  told  Slade. 
"  If  anything  happens  to  another  man  who  is  rid- 
ing for  me  and  I  have  any  reason  to  even  suspect 
you  were  at  the  bottom  of  it  I'll  swear  that  I  saw 
you  do  the  thing  yourself.  The  Three  Bar  is  the 
only  outfit  with  a  clean  enough  record  to  drag 
anything  up  for  an  airing  before  the  courts  with- 


1 14        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

out  taking  a  chance.  This  rule  of  every  man  for 
himself  won't  hold  good  with  me." 

She  moved  toward  the  wagon  and  Slade  kept 
pace  with  her,  leading  his  horse.  There  was  no 
sign  of  life  around  the  wagon  and  the  jerky 
movement  of  a  hat,  barely  visible  through  the 
tips  of  the  sage,  indicated  that  Waddles  was 
washing  out  some  clothing  at  the  creek  bank  fifty 
yards  away. 

Slade  leaned  against  the  hind  wheel  on  the  far 
side  from  the  herd  and  looked  down  at  her. 

"  You're  a  real  woman,  Billie,"  he  said.  "  You 
better  throw  in  with  a  real  man — me — and  we'll 
own  this  country.  I'll  run  the  Three  Bar  on  ten 
thousand  head  whenever  you  say  the  word." 

"  I'd  rather  see  it  on  half  as  many  through  my 
own  efforts,"  she  said.    "  And  some  day  I  will." 

"  Some  day  you'll  see  it  my  way,"  he  prophe- 
sied. "  I  know  you  better  than  any  other  man. 
You  want  an  outfit  of  your  own — and  if  the 
Three  Bar  gets  crowded  out  you'll  go  to  the  man 
that  can  give  you  one  in  its  place.  That  will  be 
me.    Some  day  we'll  trade." 

"  Some  day — right  soon — ^you'll  trade  your 
present  holdings  for  a  nice  little  range  in  hell," 
a  voice  said  in  Slade's  ear  and  at  the  same  instant 
two  huge  paws  were  thrust  from  the  little  window 
of  the  cook-wagon  and  clamped  on  his  arms 
above  the  crook  of  his  elbows.  Slade  was  a 
powerful  man  but  he  was  an  infant  in  the  grip  of 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        115 

the  two  great  hands  that  raised  him  clear  of  the 
ground  and  shook  him  before  he  was  slammed 
down  on  his  face  ten  feet  away  by  a  straight-arm 
thrust.  His  deadly  temper  flared  and  the  swift 
move  for  his  gun  was  simultaneous  with  the 
twist  which  brought  him  to  his  feet,  but  his  hand 
fell  away  from  the  butt  of  it  as  he  looked  into  the 
twin  muzzles  of  a  sawed-off  shotgun  which  men- 
aced him  from  the  window. 

It  occurred  to  him  that  the  nighthawk  must 
have  been  restless  and  had  elected  to  wash  at  the 
creek  bank  instead  of  indulging  in  sleep,  thus  ac- 
counting for  the  bobbing  hat  he  had  seen,  for  as- 
suredly it  did  not  belong  to  the  cook,  as  he  had 
surmised.  The  face  behind  the  gun  was  the  face 
of  Waddles. 

"  I'm  about  to  touch  off  a  pound  of  shot  if  you 
go  acting  up,"  Waddles  said.  "  Any  more  talk 
like  you  was  just  handing  out  and  you'll  get 
smeared  here  and  there." 

"Are  you  running  the  Three  Bar?"  Slade 
asked. 

"  Only  at  times,  when  the  notion  strikes  me," 
Waddles  said.  "  And  this  is  one.  Whenever 
you've  got  any  specific  business  to  transact  with 
us  why  come  right  along  over  and  transact  it — 
and  then  move  on  out." 

Billie  Warren  laughed  suddenly,  a  gurgle  of 
sheer  amusement  at  the  sight  of  the  most  dreaded 
man  within  a  hundred  miles  standing  there  under 


ii6        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

the  muzzle  of  a  shotgun,  receiving  instructions 
from  the  mouth  of  the  Three  Bar  coo&.  For 
Slade  was  helpless  and  knew  it.  Even  if  he  took 
a  chance  with  Waddles  and  won  out  he  would  be 
in  worse  shape  than  before,  for  if  he  turned  a 
finger  against  her  old  watchdog  and  friend  he 
would  gain  only  her  deadly  enmity. 

"  Waddles,  you  win,"  Slade  said.  "  I'll  be  go- 
ing before  you  change  your  mind." 

As  the  man  walked  toward  his  horse  which 
had  sidled  a  few  steps  away  the  big  cook  gazed 
after  him  and  fingered  the  riot  gun  regret- 
fully. 

The  wagon  did  not  move  on  when  the  men  had 
finished  working  the  herd  as  the  rest  of  the  day 
had  been  set  aside  for  kill-time.  An  hour  after 
Slade's  departure  the  hands  were  rolling  in  for 
a  sleep.  The  girl  saw  Rile  Foster  draw  apart 
from  the  rest  and  sit  with  his  back  against  a  rock. 
He  was  regarding  some  small  object  held  in  his 
hand.  As  he  turned  it  around  she  recognized  it 
as  a  boot  heel  and  the  reason  for  Rile's  absence 
was  clear  to  her.  He  had  back-tracked  the  blue 
horse  to  the  scene  of  the  mishap. 

She  was  half  asleep  when  a  voice  some  distance 
from  the  teepee  roused  her  by  speaking  the  name 
of  Bangs. 

"  I've  a  pretty  elastic  conscience  myself,"  the 
voice  went  on.  "  I'm  not  above  lifting  a  few 
calves  for  the  brand  I'm  riding  for  or  any  little 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        117 

thing  like  that,  but  this  deal  sort  of  gorges  up 
in  me.  They'll  never  cinch  it  on  to  any  man — 
they  never  do.  Old  Rile  is  brooding  over  it. 
He'll  likely  run  amuck.  One  way  or  another 
he'll  try  to  break  even  for  Bangs." 

Billie  recognized  the  voice  as  Moore's  and 
knew  that  one  of  her  men,  at  least,  had  not  for- 
gotten Bangs.  It  was  the  first  time  an  intima- 
tion that  the  affair  was  other  than  an  accident  had 
reached  her  ears. 

In  the  evening,  after  resting,  the  men  once 
more  gathered  round  a  fire  for  an  hour's  play. 
They  had  evidently  blotted  out  the  memory  of 
a  friend  who  had  raised  his  voice  with  theirs  on 
the  last  such  event,  for  they  sang  mostly  the  rol- 
licking airs  with  even  more  than  the  usual 
amount  of  chaff  between  songs.  But  there  was 
one  old  favorite  that  they  did  not  sing.  At  last 
Waddles  swung  into  the  tune  of  it  and  as  they 
buried  the  poor  cowboy  far  out  on  the  lone 
prair-ee  she  noted  the  difference  at  once,  and 
more  clearly  than  ever  before  she  divined  the  rea- 
son why  cowhands  were  apparently  so  devoid  of 
sentiment,  refusing  to  be  serious  on  any  topic, 
passing  off  those  things  nearest  to  their  hearts 
with  a  callous  jest.  It  was  only  that  there  were 
so  many  rough  spots  in  the  hard  life  they  led  that 
they  avoided  dwelling  too  seriously  on  matters 
that  could  not  be  rectified  lest  they  become 
gloomy  and  morose.     There  were  warm  hearts 


u8        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

under  the  indifferent  exteriors.  For  now  the 
voices  were  soft  and  hushed  and  she  knew  that 
every  man  was  thinking  of  the  lonely  mound  of 
rocks  that  marked  the  last  resting  place  of  Bangs. 


VII 

The  calf  round-up  was  nearing  the  end.  Two 
weeks  would  see  the  finish  and  supply  the  final 
tally.  The  figures  had  already  progressed  to  the 
point  where  they  gave  evidence  of  another  shrink- 
age from  the  count  of  the  previous  year;  and  dur- 
ing one  of  the  weekly  half -day  periods  of  rest 
three  members  of  the  Three  Bar  personnel  found 
their  minds  occupied  with  a  problem  which  ex- 
cluded all  thoughts  of  sleep.  The  problem  in 
each  case  was  the  same  but  each  one  viewed  it 
from  the  individual  standpoint  of  his  own  par- 
ticular knowledge  of  the  subject. 

Harris  sat  on  a  rock  and  reviewed  the  plans  he 
Imd  formulated  for  the  salvation  of  the  Three 
Ear  brand,  realizing  the  weak  spots  and  mapping 
out  some  special  line  of  defense  that  might  serve 
to  strengthen  them.  In  the  seclusion  of  the 
v/agon  Waddles  was  carefully  rereading  a  much- 
thumbed  document  for  perhaps  the  hundredth 
time.  A  man  had  come  in  at  daylight  with  the 
mail  from  Brill's  and  Billie  Warren  was  within 
her  teepee  poring  over  her  share  of  it.  The  men 
had  finished  theirs  and  were  sleeping. 

The  girl  read  first  the  four  letters  in  the  same 


120        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

handwriting,  one  to  mark  each  week  she  had  been 
on  the  round-up.  The  fifth  was  from  Judge  Col- 
ton,  her  father's  old  friend,  to  whose  hands  all  his 
affairs  had  been  entrusted.  After  scanning  this 
she  read  again  the  other  four.  Ever  since  her 
last  visit  to  the  Coltons,  just  prior  to  her  father's 
death,  the  arrival  of  these  letters  had  been  as 
regular  as  the  recurrence  of  Sunday,  one  for  each 
week,  and  in  moments  of  despondency  over  the 
affairs  of  the  Three  Bar  she  drew  strength  from 
them.  Very  soon  now,  in  the  course  of  a  few 
months  at  the  outside,  she  and  the  writer  would 
meet  away  from  his  native  environment  and  in 
the  midst  of  her  own.  Always  before  this  had 
been  reversed  and  her  association  with  Carlos 
Deane  had  held  a  background  of  his  own  setting, 
— a  setting  in  startling  contrast  to  her  log  house, 
nestling  in  a  desert  of  sage.  The  Deane  house 
was  a  wonderful  old-fashioned  mansion  set  in 
a  grove  of  century-old  elms  and  oaks.  She  loiew 
his  life  and  now  he  would  see  her  in  her  natural 
surroundings. 

Perhaps  it  was  her  verj''  difference  from  other 
girls  that  had  first  interested  Carlos  Deane,  and 
the  fact  that  he  stood  out  from  others,  even 
among  his  own  intimates,  that  had  drawn  her  in- 
terest to  him.  Deane  had  been  an  athlete  of  re- 
nown and  a  popular  idol  at  school  and  his  energy 
had  been  brought  to  bear  in  business  as  success- 
fully as  in  play.    In  a  hazy  sort  of  way  she  felt 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        121 

that  some  day  she  would  listen  to  the  plea  that, 
in  some  fashion  or  other,  was  woven  into  every 
letter;  but  not  till  the  Three  Bar  was  booming 
and  no  longer  required  her  supervision.  Every- 
thing else  in  the  world  was  secondary  to  her  love 
for  her  father's  brand  and  the  anxiety  of  the  past 
two  years  of  its  decline  eclipsed  all  other  issues. 

Her  reflections  were  interrupted  by  Harris's 
voice  just  outside  her  teepee. 

"  Asleep,  Billie?  "  he  asked  softly. 

"  No,"  she  said.    "What  is  it?" 

"  I've  thrown  your  saddle  on  Papoose,"  he 
mid.    "  Let's  have  a  look  around." 

She  assented  and  they  rode  off  up  the  left- 
hand  slope  of  the  valley.  A  mile  or  so  from  the 
wagon  Harris  dismounted  on  a  high  point. 

"  Let's  have  a  medicine  chat,"  he  offered. 
'*  I've  got  considerable  on  my  mind." 

She  leaned  against  a  rock  and  he  sat  cross- 
legged  on  the  ground,  facing  her  and  twisting  a 
c  igarette  as  an  aid  to  thought.  Her  head  was 
tilted  back  against  the  rock,  her  eyes  half -closed, 

"  They  say  folks  get  disappointed  in  love  and 
p:o  right  on  living,"  he  observed.  "  I  wonder 
riovx^.  I've  met  quite  a  scattering  of  girls  and 
riaybe  there  were  a  dozen  or  so  out  of  the  lot 
that  sized  up  a  shade  better  than  the  rest.  Look- 
i]ig  back  from  where  I  sit  it  occurs  to  me  that  it 
vas  a  right  colorless  assortment,  after  all.  I've 
heard  that  men  run  mostly  to  form  and  at  one 


122        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

time  or  another  let  it  out  to  some  little  lady  that 
there's  no  other  in  the  world.  That's  my  own 
state  right  about  now.  Are  you  always  going  to 
keep  on  disliking  me?  " 

"  I  don't  dislike  you,"  she  said.  She  was  still 
convinced  of  his  father's  trickery  toward  her  own; 
but  Cal  Harris's  quiet  efficiency  and  his  devotion 
to  Three  Bar  interests  had  convinced  her,  against 
her  will,  that  he  had  taken  no  part  in  it.  "  But  if 
you  brought  me  out  here  to  go  into  that  I'm  go- 
ing back." 

"  I  didn't,"  he  denied.  "  But  I  drifted  into  it 
sort  of  by  accident.  No  matter  what  topic  I  hap- 
pen to  be  conversing  on  I'm  always  thinking  how 
much  I'd  rather  be  telling  you  about  that. 
Whenever  I  make  some  simple  little  assertion 
about  things  in  general,  what  I'm  really  thinking 
is  something  like  this,  *  Billie,  right  this  minute 
I'm  loving  you  more  than  I  did  two  minutes 
back.'    You  might  keep  that  in  mind."  mt 

The  girl  did  not  answer  but  sat  looking  off 
across  the  jumbled  foothills,  rock-studded  and 
gray  with  sage.  Some  distance  from  them  a 
bare  shale-slide  extended  for  half  a  mile  along  a 
sidehill,  barren  and  devoid  of  all  vegetation. 
Here  and  there,  far  off  across  the  country,  vivid  || 
patches  on  the  slopes  indicated  thickets  of  wil-  ^ 
lows  and  birch  growing  below  spring  seeps.  A 
few  scattered  cedars  sprouted  from  the  rocky 
ledges  of  the  more  broken  country  and  a  clump 


I 


t 


I 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        123 

of  gnarled,  wind-twisted  cottonwoods  marked  a 
distant  water  hole.  A  whitish  glare  was  reflected 
from  an  alkali  flat  in  the  bottom  of  a  shallow 
basin.  Twenty  miles  to  the  north  the  first  rims 
of  the  hills  rose  out  of  the  low  country  and 
through  the  breaks  in  them  she  could  see  long 
sloping  valleys  of  lodgepole,  the  dark  green  re- 
lieved by  the  pale  silvery  sheen  of  aspen  clumps ; 
dense  spruce  jungles  of  the  more  precipitous 
slopes  topped  by  rugged  peaks  covered  with  per- 
petual snow;  certainly  no  soft  or  homelike  scene. 
One  must  be  filled  with  a  vast  love  of  it — or 
die  of  it — for  without  that  love  of  the  open  life 
vould  be  a  deadly  thing  to  bear  in  a  desert  of 
sage. 

"  I've  always  loved  it,"  she  said.  "  Whenever 
I've  been  away  there  always  came  a  time  when  I 
was  restless  to  get  back.  I've  always  felt  that  it 
would  kill  me  to  leave  with  the  idea  that  I'd  never 
see  the  Three  Bar  range  again.  But  now  the 
country  has  changed.  At  times  it  seems  as  if  it 
Av^ould  be  a  vast  relief  to  me  to  leave  it  all  be- 
liind." 

"  It's  the  people  that  have  changed,"  he  said. 
*'  It's  only  the  history  of  all  frontiers.  The  first 
settlers  win  it  for  themselves.  Then  clashing  ele- 
ments creep  in;  sheep  and  cattle  wars;  stockmen 
and  squatter  quarrels;  later  the  weeding  out  of 
the  wild  bunch — parasites  like  Harper's  crew: 
still  later  there'll  be  squabbles  between  the  nesters 


124        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

themselves;  jumping  claims  and  rowing  over 
water  rights.  Then  it  will  all  iron  out,  the  country 
will  settle  up  according  to  its  topography  and 
give  its  best  to  the  human  race.  You  may  grow 
to  think  you  hate  the  hills  for  what  happens  to 
you  individually  during  the  change — but  it's 
in  your  blood  to  love  them  and  that  love  will  al- 
ways return." 

"  It  may  return  if  the  Three  Bar  weathers  the 
change,"  she  said. 

"  We'll  weather  it,"  he  asserted  cheerfully. 
"  Shall  I  tell  you  how? " 

"Yes.  Tell  me,"  she  said.  "  I'd  like  to  know. 
The  Three  Bar  is  going  to  show  another  loss 
this  year." 

"  And  likely  the  next,"  he  assented.  "  Maybe 
still  another.    But  that  will  be  about  all." 

"  That  will  surely  be  all,"  she  said.  "  Two 
more  years  of  decrease  and  there  won't  be  enough 
left  of  the  Three  Bar  to  divide." 

"  Listen,"  he  said,  tapping  his  knee  with  a 
forefinger  to  emphasize  his  point.  "  Cal  War- 
ren always  wanted  to  put  the  Three  Bar  flats 
under  cultivation.  He's  probably  told  you  that  a 
hundred  times." 

"  A  thousand,"  she  amplified.  "  But  the  senti- 
ment of  the  country  was  against  it  the  same  as  it 
is  to-day." 

"  But  it's  not,"  he  contradicted. 

**Then    why    all    those    signs?"    she    asked. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        123; 

"  They  run  every  squatter  out  now  just  as  they 
always  did." 

"  Who?  "  he  asked.  "  Do  you  have  a  hand  in 
it?" 

"  No,"  she  said.     "  The  others  do." 

"  Probably  they  think  the  same  of  you,"  he 
pointed  out.  "  There's  just  one  man  in  this  coun- 
try that  profits  by  keeping  that  no-squatter  senti- 
ment alive." 

"  You  must  hate  Blade,"  she  observed. 

"  I  haven't  any  feeling  toward  him  one  way  or 
the  other,"  he  asserted.  "  He's  an  obstacle,  that's 
all.  That's  the  way  he  would  feel  about  me  if  I 
stood  in  his  way.  There's  at  least  one  Slade  in 
every  locality  and  in  every  line  of  business 
throughout  the  world.  Ambition  for  power.  He 
wants  the  whole  countryside.  If  he'd  win  out  on 
that  he'd  want  the  next — and  finally  he'd  want 
the  world." 

"  He  has  this  particular  part  of  the  world  un* 
der  his  thumb,"  she  said. 

"  But  he  won't  have  for  long,"  he  insisted. 
'*  He's  topheavy  and  ripe  for  a  fall.  Those  signs 
are  all  that  saves  him  from  going  to  pieces  like 
an  over-inflated  balloon.  He's  the  only  man  we'll 
have  to  fight." 

"  What  convinces  you  of  that?  "  she  asked. 

"  See  here,"  he  urged,  the  emphasizing  fore- 
finger tapping  again.  "  This  will  always  be 
range  country.     It  will  only  support  a  certain 


126        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

number  of  cows.  If  the  Three  Bar  had  a  section 
in  hay  to  winter-feed  your  stuff  you  could  run 
double  what  you  do  now  on  the  same  range.  It's 
the  same  with  every  other  small  concern.  There's 
only  a  few  spots  suitable  for  home-ranch  sites 
and  every  one  of  those  has  a  brand  running  out 
of  it  now — exceptmg  those  sites  down  in  Slade's 
range.  If  all  those  outfits  put  in  hay  it  wouldn't 
cut  up  the  range  any  more  than  it  is  now — except 
down  Slade's  way.  Every  outfit  in  the  country 
could  rim  twice  as  many  head  as  they  do  now — 
except  Slade.    He  couldn't." 

"  Why? "  she  asked.  "  Why  wouldn't  that  ap- 
ply to  him  as  well  ?  " 

"  Because  he's  strung  out  over  a  hundred  miles. 
The  minute  farming  starts  there'll  be  squatters 
filing  on  every  quarter  where  they  can  get  water 
to  put  it  in  crop.  There's  twenty  places  Slade 
would  have  to  cover  by  filings  to  hold  his  range 
where  the  others  would  only  have  to  file  on  one 
to  control  the  amount  of  range  they're  using 
now." 

She  nodded  as  she  caught  this  point. 

"  Folks  have  fallen  into  a  set  habit  of  mind," 
he  explained.  "  You  think  because  every  squat- 
ter is  burned  out  that  every  outfit  but  the  Three 
Bar  is  against  sticking  a  plow  in  the  ground. 
The  rest  probably  feel  the  same  way — ^Icnow  they 
haven't  a  hand  in  it  but  figure  that  you  have.  As 
a  matter  of  fact,  it's  Slade  alone.    That's  how  I 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        127 

got  a  line  on  Morrow  the  first  night  I  landed.  I 
said  something  about  putting  in  hay  and  he  came 
light  to  the  front  and  made  a  red-hot  anti-squat- 
ier  talk.     I  knew  right  off  he  was  Slade's  man." 

"  How  could  you  be  sure  of  that? "  she  asked. 
"  I've  heard  men  with  every  outfit  express  the 
same  views." 

"  Morrow  hasn't  a  brand  of  his  own,"  Harris 
said.  "  He  wouldn't  lose  a  dollar  if  the  whole 
lange  was  under  fence.  He's  drawing  down 
money  to  keep  that  feeling  alive.  You'll  find 
one  with  every  outfit  in  this  country.  And  the 
(;hances  are  you'll  find  every  one  of  them  over- 
looking a  few  calves  on  his  circle — same  as  Mor- 
row did.  There's  a  persistent  rumor  to  the  effect 
that  any  man  who  burns  out  a  squatter  can  drop 
in  at  Slade's  and  get  five  hundred  dollars  in  cash. 
The  wild  bunch  will  handle  every  case  that  turns 
up  if  that  rumor  is  true." 

"  The  sheriff  has  never  been  able  to  pick  up  a 
single  one  of  the  men  who  have  burned  those 
squatters  out,"  she  said. 

"And  he  never  will  without  some  help,"  Harris 
iigreed.  "Alden's  hands  are  tied.  He's  only  an 
ornament  right  now  and  folks  have  come  to  be- 
lieve he's  real  harmless.  But  Alden  is  playing 
his  own  game  single-handed  the  best  he  can.  One 
day  he'll  get  his  hooks  into  some  of  these  torch- 
bearers  so  deep  they'll  never  shake  them  out. 
The  homestead  laws  can't  be  defied  indefinitely. 


128        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

The  government  will  take  a  hand  and  send  mar- 
shals in  here  thicker  than  flies.  Then  the  outfits 
that  have  hedged  themselves  in  advance  are  on 
top.     The  rest  are  through." 

"  But  what  can  the  Three  Bar  do  against  Slade 
until  those  marshals  come?  "  she  asked. 

"  There's  a  difference  between  sacking  an  es- 
tablished outfit  with  a  big  force  of  hands  and 
burning  out  some  isolated  squatter  roosting  in  a 
wagon,"  Harris  said.  "  I've  filed  on  water  out 
of  the  Crazy  Loop  to  cover  the  section  I  bought 
in  the  flats.  We  can  pick  men  and  give  ihem  a 
job  with  the  Three  Bar  between  spells  of  doing 
prove-up  work.  We  can  put  in  a  company  ditch 
to  cover  all  the  filings,  pay  them  for  working  on 
it  and  charge  their  pro-rata  share  of  improve- 
ments up  against  each  man's  final  settlement. 
When  they've  made  final  proof  we  can  buy  out 
those  who  want  to  sell." 

"  The  cost  of  a  project  like  that  would  be  too 
big  for  the  Three  Bar  to  stand,"  she  objected. 

"  I'll  put  it  up,"  he  offered.  "  The  money 
from  the  sale  of  the  little  old  Box  L.  I  want  to 
see  this  go  through.  We  can  square  accounts 
when  the  Three  Bar  makes  the  top  of  the  hill." 

He  pointed  to  a  bunch  of  cows  that  fed  in  a 
bottom  below  them. 

"  Look  at  that.  Every  color  under  the  sim — 
and  every  shape.  Let's  put  the  flats  in  hay,  girl, 
and  start  gi^ading  the  Three  Bar  up.     We'll 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        129 

^veed  out  the  runty  humpbacked  critters  and  all 
off -color  she-stuff;  keep  only  straight  red  cows. 
It  doesn't  take  much  more  feed  to  turn  out  a  real 
beef  steer  than  one  of  those  knife-backed  brothers 
down  in  the  flat.  We'll  gather  our  own  cows 
(;lose  to  the  home  ranch  and  shove  other  brands 
off  our  range,  throw  forty  white-face  bulls  out 
(lose  round  the  place  and  start  building  up  real 
])eef ;  steers  that  will  bring  fifty  a  head  where 
those  runts  bring  twenty-five.  And  big  red  she- 
e  tock  will  bring  more  money  too.  In  five  years 
we'll  have  a  straight  red  brand  and  the  Three 
.3ar  will  be  rated  at  thirty  dollars  a  head,  come  as 
ihey  run  on  the  range,  instead  of  round  ten  or 
twelve  as  they'd  figure  us  now.  We'll  have  good 
hay  land  that  will  be  worth  more  by  itself  than 
the  whole  brand  is  to-day.  Say  the  word,  girl, 
iind  we'll  build  up  the  old  outfit  that  both  of  our 
folks  helped  to  found." 

The  girl  had  closed  her  eyes  as  he  painted  this 
])icture  of  possibilities  and  except  for  the  differ- 
(nce  of  voice  it  might  well  have  been  old  Cal 
Warren  speaking;  the  views  and  sentiments  were 
the  same  she  had  so  often  heard  her  father  ex- 
])ress.  Next  to  the  longed-for  partnership  with 
c^ld  Bill  Harris  the  dream  of  his  life  had  been  to 
see  the  Three  Bar  flats  a  smooth  meadow  of  al- 
falfa. 

"  I'll  put  a  bunch  of  terriers  in  there  that  will 
1)6  hard   for    Slade   to   uproot,"    Harris    said. 


130        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"Wliat  do  you  say,   Billie?     Let's  give  it   a 
try." 

"  I'd  like  to  see  it  done,"  she  said.  "  But  so 
much  depends  on  the  outcome.  I'll  have  to  write 
Judge  Colton  first.  He  has  all  my  affairs  in 
charge." 

Harris  smiled  across  at  her. 

"  That's  right  peculiar,"  he  observed.  "  The 
Judge  is  holding  the  reins  over  my  little  pros- 
pects too.  They've  tangled  your  interests  and 
mine  up  all  along  the  line  it  seems.  You  drop  a 
line  to  Judge  Colton  and  sort  of  outline  the  plan. 
Maybe  he'll  see  it  our  way." 

They  mounted  and  rode  back  to  the  wagon  and 
the  girl  went  straight  to  Waddles  with  the  propo- 
sition Harris  had  urged.  The  big  man  had 
fallen  asleep  with  the  paper  he  had  been  perusing 
still  clutched  in  his  hand. 

"  Tell  him  to  go  his  best,"  Waddles  advised, 
when  she  had  outlined  Harris's  scheme.  "  He'll 
put  a  bunch  of  terriers  on  the  Three  Bar  that  will 
cut  Slade's  claws.  If  they  burn  out  the  boys  Cal 
Harris  puts  on  the  place  then  there'll  be  one  real 
war  staged  at  the  old  Three  Bar." 

"  He's  been  telling  you,"  she  accused. 

"  He  did  sort  of  mention  it,"  Waddles  con- 
fessed. 

"  Then  his  idea  is  to  import  a  bunch  of  gun- 
fighters,"  she  said.  "  I  won't  have  a  bunch  of 
hired  killers  living  at  the  Three  Bar." 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        131 

"  These  boys  will  just  be  the  sort  that's  handy 
at  knowing  how  to  avoid  getting  killed  them- 
selves," Waddles  evaded.  "  You  can't  rightly 
blame  any  man  for  that.  And  besides,  Slade  has 
to  be  met  on  his  own  ground." 

"  Do  you  think  Slade  is  at  the  bottom  of  the 
Three  Bar  losses  every  year? "  she  asked. 

"  Every  hoof,"  Waddles  stated.  "  Every  last 
head!  Maybe  the  albino's  layout  rustles  an  odd 
bunch  on  and  off.  But  Slade  is  the  man  that's 
out  to  wreck  your  brand."  The  big  cook  heaved 
a  sigh  as  he  reached  a  decision  on  a  matter  which 
had  been  troubling  him  for  days.  "  That's  what 
Cal  Warren  was  afraid  of — Slade's  branching 
out  our  way  like  he  had  already  toward  the  south. 
And  that's  one  reason  he  left  things  tied  up  the 
way  he  did." 

He  tapped  the  much-thumbed  document  on  his 
knee  and  handed  it  to  the  girl. 

**  You  and  Yoimg  Cal  have  been  sort  of  half- 
hostile,"  he  said.  "  Cast  an  eye  over  that  and 
maybe  it'll  help  you  two  youngsters  to  get 
along." 

Three  times  the  girl  read  every  word  of  the 
paper  while  Waddles  smoked  his  pipe  in  silence. 
Then  she  sat  on  the  gate  of  the  wagon  and 
gazed  off  across  the  sage ;  and  she  was  picturing 
again  the  long  trail  of  the  Three  Bar  cows;  but 
this  time  she  was  reconstructing  the  scene  at  the 
end  of  it.     Instead  of  one  man  scheming  to  trick 


132        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

an  old  friend  at  the  last  crossing  of  their  trails  she 
now  visioned  two  old  men  regretting  that  the  life- 
long hope  of  a  partnership  had  never  been  ful- 
filled and  planning  to  cement  that  arrangement 
in  the  next  generation.  For  old  Bill  Harris  had 
left  her  a  full  half -interest  in  everything  he 
owned  on  earth  with  the  single  stipulation  that 
she  retain  her  half  of  the  Three  Bar  for  five  years 
after  her  father's  death. 

"  But  why?  "  she  asked  presently.  "  Why  did 
he  do  that  for  me?  He'd  never  seen  me  since  I 
was  three  years  old." 

"  He  did  it  for  the  girl  of  old  Cal  Warren,  the 
best  friend  he  had  topside  of  ground,"  Waddles 
said.  "  Your  dad  and  Bill  Harris  had  been  pals 
since  they  was  hatched." 

"  But  why  didn't  they  let  us  know? "  she  in- 
sisted. "  Instead  of  tangling  it  up  in  this  round- 
about way? " 

"  Bill  Harris  had  a  soft  spot  in  his  heart  for 
the  old  Three  Bar  the  same  as  your  daddy  had," 
Waddles  said.  "  They  knew  there  was  hard 
times  and  changes  ahead  and  both  hated  to  think 
of  the  old  brand  going  under  or  changing  hands. 
They  was  afraid  that  if  both  you  and  the  boy 
knew  your  path  was  going  to  be  carpeted  soft  in 
any  event  that  you  might  sell  out  if  things  got  to 
breaking  wrong.  This  way  it  looked  like  you'd 
be  sure  to  stick.  But  they  both  knew  too  that 
when  old  folks  go  mixing  into  young  folks'  affairs 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        133 

without  consulting  them,  things  are  liable  to  get 
all  snarled.  So  they  hedged  it  for  both  of 
you." 

"  How?  "  she  asked.  "  What  if  either  or  both 
of  us  should  have  refused  to  abide  by  the  terms?  " 

"  Then  both  properties  would  have  been  split 
between  the  two  of  you,  the  same  as  if  you'd  car- 
ried them  out,"  he  said.  "  You  didn't  go  and 
think  now,  Pet,  that  them  two  wise  old  heads  was 
going  to  leave  the  youngsters  in  the  lurch !  They 
was  planning  the  best  they  knew.  Your  dad 
told  me  to  keep  an  eye  on  the  general  lay.  And 
Judge  Colton  sent  me  that  copy  to  have  on  hand 
to  sort  of  iron  things  out  when  I  thought  best. 
I'm  telling  you  because  I  know  you  wouldn't  quit 
the  Three  Bar  as  long  as  there's  two  cows  left." 

"  Does  Cal  know?  "  she  asked. 

"  Not  a  word,"  Waddles  asserted.  "  He's 
likely  considerable  puzzled  himself.  But  he's  of 
a  optimistic  turn  of  mind,  Cal  is,  and  white  folks 
too.  He  surmises  things  will  break  right  some 
day,  knowing  his  own  dad  and  havin'  visited 
round  a  day  or  two  with  yours.  *  I  don't  know 
what  they're  at,'  he  says  to  me.  '  But  they  was 
both  square  shooters,  those  old  boys,  and  what- 
ever it  was  they  didn't  aim  to  cook  up  any  misery 
for  either  the  little  girl  or  me,  so  what's  the  use  to 
fret? '  You  drop  the  Judge  a  line,  girl,  and  turn 
Harris  loose  to  rip  up  the  Three  Bar  flat  and  seed 
it  down  to  hay." 


134        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

She  nodded  and  slipped  from  the  end-gate  of 
the  wagon,  taking  the  paper  with  her.  Harris 
was  soaking  a  flannel  shirt  in  the  little  stream, 
flattening  it  in  a  riffle  and  weighting  it  down  with 
rocks.  She  went  straight  to  him  and  sat  on  the 
bank,  motioning  him  to  a  seat  by  her  side.  He 
dried  his  hands  and  took  the  paper  she  held  out 
to  him. 

"  What's  in  the  wind?  "  he  asked. 

She  nodded  to  indicate  the  document  and  he 
sat  down  to  look  over  it.  His  quizzical  expres- 
sion was  erased  as  he  saw  his  father's  name  and 
the  girl  watched  his  face  for  some  evidence  of  re- 
sentment as  he  read  on.  Their  status  was  now 
reversed,  for  Bill  Harris's  holdings  had  been  eas- 
ily double  those  of  her  own  pareut.  She  saw  the 
sun  wrinkles  deepen  at  the  corners  of  his  eyes  as 
he  grasped  the  text  of  it  and  he  looked  up  at  her 
and  laughed. 

"  Now  we're  resting  easy,"  he  said.  "An  even 
trade." 

"  Uneven,"  she  dissented.  "  Of  course  you 
know  that  I'll  not  take  advantage  of  that." 

"Accounts  are  all  squared  off  between  us  now," 
he  said.  "And  of  course  you'll  do  just  what  it 
says."  He  held  up  his  hand  as  she  started  to  dis- 
sent. "Don't  you!"  he  reproved.  "Let's  let 
that  end  of  it  slide — rest  for  a  while.  Maybe 
some  day  we'll  lump  both  into  one  and  the  two  of 
us  boss  the  whole  job." 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        131 

She  rested  a  hand  on  his  arm. 

"  Of  course  you  know  I'm  sorry  for  a  number 
of  things  I've  said  to  you,"  she  said.  "  But  I 
want  to  thank  you  for  being  too  decent  to  return 
them  in  kind.     You're  real  folks,  Cal." 

"  Good  girl,  Billie,"  he  thanked  her.  "As  to 
what  you  said,  it's  remarkable  that  you  didn't  say 
more.  I  laiew  you  weren't  crabbing  over  what 
you  might  lose  for  yourself  but  over  the  thought 
that  your  father  had  been  tricked.  I  tried  to  put 
myself  in  your  place  and  if  I'd  been  you  I  know 
I'd  have  kicked  me  off  the  place,  or  told  Waddles 
to  turn  loose  his  wolf." 

He  switched  abruptly  away  from  the  topic  in 
hand  and  reverted  to  the  subject  they  had  dis- 
cussed an  hour  past. 

"  We've  a  clear  field  now  with  nothing  on  our 
minds  but  the  job  of  putting  the  Three  Bar  on 
its  feet,"  he  said.  "  The  Three  Bar  is  a  pretty 
small  outfit  the  way  things  are  to-day  but  in  a 
few  more  years  the  brand  that  runs  three  thou- 
sand head  will  be  almost  in  the  class  of  cattle 
kings.  The  range  will  be  settled  with  an  outfit 
roosting  on  every  available  site.  The  big  fellows 
will  find  their  range  cut  up  and  then  they're 
through.  If  the  Three  Bar  files  on  all  the  water 
out  of  Crazy  Loop  and  covers  the  flat  with  hay 
we'll  control  all  the  range  for  a  number  of  miles 
each  way.  There's  not  another  site  short  of 
Brandon's  place  west  of  us — twelve  miles  or  so; 


136        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

about  the  same  to  the  east;  still  farther  off  south 
of  us.     We'll  be  riding  the  crest." 

"  If  we  can  only  hold  on  against  Slade,"  she 
agreed.     "  But  can  we?  " 

"  Watch  us !  "  he  said.  "  The  Brandons  would 
file  on  their  home  basin  and  put  the  V  L  bottoms 
in  hay  to-morrow  if  they  could.  McVey's  been 
wanting  to  do  it  on  the  Halfmoon  D  ever  since 
he  bought  out  the  brand  five  years  back.  They're 
all  afraid  to  start.  But  they'll  be  for  us — and 
follow  us  as  soon  as  we  show  them  it  can  be  done. 
Art  Brandon  is  repping  with  us  and  I've  been 
sounding  him  out.  You  talk  to  him.  In  the 
meantime  you  try  and  get  a  letter  off  to  the 
Judge  to-day." 

The  girl  nodded. 

"  We'll  try  it,"  she  said.  "  I  know  that  Cal 
Warren  would  rather  see  the  Three  Bar  go  to 
pieces  from  its  own  pressure,  fighting  from  the 
inside  to  grow,  than  to  see  it  whittled  doAvn  from 
the  outside  without  our  fighting  back." 

She  crossed  to  her  teepee  to  write  the  letter 
asking  Judge  Colton's  advice  on  this  matter 
which  would  mean  the  turning  point  in  Three 
Bar  affairs.  An  hour  later  a  man  rode  away 
from  the  wagon,  his  bed  roll  packed  on  a  led 
horse,  heading  for  Brill's  with  the  message  that 
meant  so  much  to  the  Three  Bar.  As  he  left 
Harris  handed  him  two  letters  he  had  written 
weeks  past,  before  leaving  the  ranch. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        137 

Presumably  only  the  three  of  them  knew  of  the 
intended  move  but  in  the  course  of  the  next  few 
days  it  had  become  rumored  among  the  men  that 
the  Three  Bar  was  to  turn  into  a  farming  outfit. 
The  girl  learned  that  Carpenter  was  the  source  of 
these  whispers.  Hanson,  the  rep  from  the  Half- 
moon  D,  apprised  her  of  this  fact. 

Ever  since  the  departure  of  Morrow  Carp  had 
been  sullen.  Twice  he  had  taken  excej)tions  to 
some  order  of  Harris's  but  the  new  foreman  had 
j)atiently  overlooked  the  fact.  However  on  the 
fifth  day  after  the  departure  of  Home  with  the 
letter  to  Judge  Colton,  Harris  whirled  on  the 
man  as  he  made  an  anti-squatter  remark  when 
the  hands  were  gathered  for  the  noon  meal. 

"  That'll  be  all,"  he  said.  "  I'll  figure  out 
3  our  time.  You  took  things  up  where  Morrow 
left  off.  Now  you  can  go  hunt  him  up  and  com- 
pare notes." 

"  Can't  a  man  speak  his  mind? "  Carp  de- 
manded. 

"  He  can  talk  his  head  off,"  Harris  said. 
''  But  he  can't  overlook  any  Three  Bar  calves  on 
his  circle  while  I'm  running  the  layout.  Morrow 
tried  that  on  while  he  was  breaking  you  in." 

Carp  surveyed  the  faces  of  the  men  and  started 
1 3  speak  but  changed  his  mind  and  headed  for  the 
rope  corral. 

"  He's  a  cringing  sort  of  miscreant,"  Moore 
said  as  Carp  rode  off.     "  He  was  even  afraid  to 


138        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

speak  up  for  himself — thought  maybe  the  boys 
would  pass  sentence  on  hmi  before  he  could  get 
out  of  sight.  I  expect  Carp  Is  poor  sort  of 
folks." 

"  That's  going  to  leave  us  short-handed,"  Har- 
ris said  to  the  girl.  "  Morrow,  Carp  and  Bangs 
— three  short.  Home  ought  to  get  back  from 
Brill's  to-day.  We've  only  one  more  week  out 
so  I  guess  we  can  worry  through." 

"  How  did  you  know?  "  she  asked.  "  About 
Carp,  I  mean." 

"  Lanky  caught  him  overlooking  a  bunch  of 
cows  with  calves,"  Harris  explained.  "  Lanky 
is  worth  double  pay." 

The  Three  Bar  girl  had  noted  that  Carpenter 
had  been  much  with  Bentley,  Slade's  rep,  since 
Morrow  had  gone.  She  had  come  to  be  suspi- 
cious of  all  things  connected  with  Slade. 

"  Are  you  watching  Bentley?  "  she  asked. 

Harris  shook  his  head. 

"  No  use,"  he  said.  "  Slade  wouldn't  work 
that  way.  Bentley  is  his  known  representative 
and  anything  Bent  might  do  would  reflect  on 
Slade.  Slade  only  works  through  one  or  two 
others  who  arrange  for  all  the  rest.  Morrow  is 
likely  one  of  his  right-hand  men.  He'd  fix  it  for 
Carp  without  Slade's  name  even  coming  into  it  at 
all.  Carp  might  have  a  good  idea  where  the 
money  came  from  but  he'd  draw  it  from  Morrow 
and  never  get  to  the  man  behind.     We'll  never 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        139 

get  anything  on  Bentley  for  that  reason — because 
he's  known  to  draw  Slade's  pay." 

"  Then  how  can  we  ever  prove  anything  on 
Slade? "  she  insisted. 

"  It's  ten  to  one  we  can't,"  he  said.  "  Even  if 
one  of  his  chief  fixers  should  turn  hhn  up  it 
wouldn't  work.  It  would  be  the  same  old  story 
— the  word  of  an  owner  against  that  of  a  self- 
confessed  thief.  We  may  have  to  handle  Slade 
without  proof." 

Home  came  back  from  Brill's  in  the  early 
evening  and  another  man  rode  with  him. 

"  Alden,"  Billie  said.  "  I  wonder  what  the 
sheriff  is  doing  out  in  here." 

The  sheriff  stripped  the  saddle  from  his  horse 
and  the  wrangler  swooped  down  to  haze  the  ani- 
mal in  with  the  remuda  as  Alden  joined  Harris 
and  the  girl.  He  was  a  tall,  gaunt  man  with  a 
slight  stoop.  His  keen  gray  eyes  peered  forth 
from  a  maze  of  sun-wrinkles  surmounted  by 
bushy  eyebrows,  the  drooping  gray  mustache  ac- 
centuating rather  than  detracting  from  the  hawk- 
like strength  of  countenance.  He  dropped  a  hand 
on  the  girl's  shoulder  and  looked  down  at  her. 

"  How  are  things  breaking  this  season,  Billie?" 
he  asked.     "  Everything  running  smooth?  " 

"About  the  same,"  she  said.  They  were  old 
friends  and  the  girl  knew  that  Alden  would  help 
her  in  any  possible  way. 

The  sheriff  turned  to  Harris. 


140        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  I  see  youVe  settled  down  to  a  steady  job, 
Cal,  instead  of  browsing  round  the  hills  alone.  I 
run  across  Home  at  Brill's  and  he  was  telling  me 
about  some  one  gunning  for  you  from  the  brush. 
Morrow,  he  says.  Do  you  want  me  to  pick  Mor- 
row up?" 

"  It  would  only  waste  your  time,"  Harris  said. 
"  We  couldn't  prove  it  on  him — the  way  things 
are." 

"  Fact,"  Alden  agreed.  "  But  I  could  hold 
him  till  after  you're  back  at  the  ranch.  Some 
day  folks  may  wake  up  and  need  a  sheriff.  It's 
hard  to  say." 

The  men  had  finished  working  the  herd  and 
were  crowding  around  the  wagon  for  their  meal. 

"  You  go  ahead  and  eat,  Billie,"  Alden  said. 
"  Cal  and  I'll  feed  a  little  later  on.  I've  got  a 
fuss  to  pick  with  Cal." 

Billie  left  them  together  and  the  sheriff  squat- 
ted on  his  heels. 

"  What's  this  rumor  about  your  farming  the 
Three  Bar?"  he  asked.  "Home  said  all  the 
hands  were  guessing,  but  I  haven't  heard  any- 
thing about  it  outside." 

"And  I  don't  want  it  leaking  out  before  we 
start,"  Harris  said.  "  But  we're  going  to  break 
out  the  flat.  I  had  the  plans  all  laid  and  sent 
word  off.  Things  are  moving  toward  the  start 
riirht  now." 

It'll  stir  things  up,"  Alden  predicted.     With 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        141 

one  forefinger  he  traced  a  design  in  the  dust,  then 
blotted  it  out.  "  I'll  play  in  with  you  the  best  I 
can." 

"  We've  got  to  make  a  clean  split,"  Harris 
said.  "  Get  the  wild  ones  definitely  set  aj)art. 
Then  they  can  be  handled."  When  he  spoke 
again  it  was  apparently  as  if  to  himself.  "Al 
Moody  sprung  it  in  the  Gallatin  country  a  few 
years  back,"  he  said  reflectively.  "And  old  Con 
Ristine  worked  it  on  the  Nations  Cow-trail 
twenty  years  ago.     It  always  brings  the  split." 

"  That  kind  of  thing  is  dead  against  the  law," 
the  sheriff  said.  "  But  it  works  right  well — that 
backfire  stuff.  And  it's  never  been  proved  on 
either  Al  Moody  or  old  Con  Ristine,  so  I  hear." 

"  But  of  course  I  wouldn't  have  a  hand  in  any- 
thing like  that,"  Harris  stated. 

"  No.  Neither  would  I,"  said  the  sheriff. 
"  Nothing  like  that." 

Alden  was  regarding  old  Rile  Foster  who  had 
drawn  apart  from  the  rest  and  was  eating  his 
meal  in  solitude.  The  old  man  had  taken  a  boot 
heel  from  his  pocket  and  was  studying  it  as  if  fas- 
cinated by  the  somber  reflections  it  roused  in  him. 
Alden  shook  his  head  as  he  rose  and  moved 
toward  the  wagon. 

"  Home  was  telling  me  about  Bangs  too,"  he 
said.  "  Pretty  tough  for  Rile.  They  was  as 
close  as  father  and  son,  those  two." 

Harris  and  the  sheriff  joined  the  rest  at  the 


142        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

wagon  and  held  out  plates  and  cups  to  Waddles. 
The  girl  was  oddly  excited,  anxious  for  the  start, 
now  that  the  decision  had  been  made. 

"  How  long  will  it  take  to  get  things  moving 
after  we  get  back?  "  she  asked. 

"  Not  more  than  a  week  at  the  outside,"  Har- 
ris said.    "  Probably  less." 

"  You  don't  mean  that,"  she  stated.  "  I  want 
to  know  the  truth." 

"  You  have  it,"  he  assured  her.  "  I  had  the 
plans  all  laid.  Our  crew  is  already  headed  for 
the  Three  Bar.  Before  they  get  there  every  man 
will  have  filed  on  a  quarter  I  designated  for  him. 
Inside  a  week  we'll  have  covered  the  flat." 

Long  after  the  hands  had  turned  in  for  the 
night  she  heard  a  faint  murmur  of  voices  and 
looked  from  her  teepee.  The  brilliant  moonlight 
showed  Harris  and  the  sheriff  sitting  off  by  them- 
selves. For  no  apparent  reason  she  thought  of 
Carlos  Deane  and,  point  by  point,  she  contrasted 
him  with  the  man  who  sat  talking  to  the  sheriff. 
Each  was  almost  super-efiicient  in  his  own  chosen 
line  and  she  caught  herself  wondering  what  each 
one  would  do  if  suddenly  transplanted  to  the  en- 
vironment of  the  other.  Then  her  mind  occupied 
itself  with  Harris  who  would  soon  break  out  the 
first  plow  furrow  that  had  ever  scarred  the  range 
within  a  radius  of  fifty  miles  and  she  pictured 
again  a  sign  she  had  seen  that  day:  "  Squatter 
let  your  wagon  wheels  keep  turning." 


VIII 

Three  heavy  wagons,  each  dra^'^n  by  four  big 
mules,  traveled  north  along  the  Coldriver  stage 
trail.  Every  wagon  was  loaded  to  the  brim  of 
the  triple  box.  Two  men  were  mounted  on  each 
wagon  seat,  the  man  beside  the  driver  balancing 
a  rifle  across  his  knees.  The  butt  of  another  pro- 
truded from  a  saddle  scabbard  that  was  lashed  to 
each  wagon  within  easy  reach  of  the  man  who 
handled  the  reins. 

"  Nice  place  to  camp.  Tiny,"  said  the  guard 
on  the  lead  wagon.  He  pointed  off  across  a  flat 
beside  the  road  toward  a  sign  that  loomed  in  the 
center.  The  black-browed  giant  designated  as 
Tiny  swung  the  mules  off  the  road  and  headed 
for  the  sign.  The  three  wagons  were  drawn  up 
some  fifteen  yards  apart  in  the  shape  of  a  tri- 
angle, the  mules  unhitched  and  given  a  feed  of 
grain  from  nose-bags,  tied  to  the  wagons  and 
supplied  with  baled  hay.  Tiny  walked  over  and 
viewed  the  sign. 

"  Squatter  don't  let  sunset  find  you  here,"  he 
read. 

"  It's  about  that  time  now,"  he  obsenred, 
squinting  over  his  shoulder.    "  It'd  be  a  mistake 


144        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

to  leave  evidence  like  that  around."  He  tore 
down  the  sign  and  worked  it  into  firewood  with 
an  axe.  "  Now  they  can't  do  nothing  to  us  for 
drifting  in  here  by  error,"  he  remarked  to  his 
companions.    "  It  wouldn't  be  fair." 

While  four  of  them  slept  the  other  two  re- 
mained  awake,  rousing  a  second  pair  after  a 
three-hour  period.  In  the  morning  the  three 
wagons  lumbered  on.  Near  sunset  they  passed 
another  sign  where  the  Three  Bar  road  branched 
off  to  the  left.    Tiny  pulled  up  the  mules. 

"  Uproot  that  little  beauty,  Russet,"  he  ad- 
vised.   "  We're  getting  close  to  home." 

The  carrot-haired  guard  descended  and  threw 
his  weight  against  the  sign,  working  it  from  side 
to  side  until  the  posts  were  loosened  in  the 
ground,  pried  it  up  and  loaded  it  on  the  wagon. 

"  Quick  work,  Russ,"  the  big  man  compli- 
mented. "  For  a  little  sawed-off  runt,  you're 
real  spry  and  active."  He  clucked  to  the  mules 
and  they  settled  steadily  into  the  collars  and 
moved  on  to  the  Three  Bar.  As  they  rolled  up 
the  lane  the  freighters  could  see  the  chuck  wagon 
drawn  up  before  the  house,  the  remuda  milling 
round  the  big  pasture  lot  and  a  number  of  men 
moving  among  the  buildings.  The  calf  round-up 
was  over. 

The  Three  Bar  men  viewed  the  freighters  curi- 
ously as  they  swung  the  mule  teams  in  front  of 
the  blacksmith  shop,  noted  the  rifle  in  the  hands 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        145 

of  each  guard  and  the  second  one  in  easy  reach 
of  each  driver.    They  Imew  what  this  portended. 

The  freighters  had  stripped  off  the  wagon- 
sheet  lashed  across  the  top  of  each  load  and  the 
Three  Bar  men  moved  casually  toward  the 
wagons,  curious  to  view  the  contents. 

"  You  boys  get  to  knowing  each  other,"  Har- 
ris said.  "  These  mule-skinners  will  be  hanging 
out  at  the  Three  Bar  from  now  on." 

The  short  man,  known  as  Russet,  removed  his 
hat  and  scratched  his  head  reflectively  as  he 
studied  the  first  move  in  unloading  his  wagon. 
Moore  promptly  uncovered  his  own  head  and  re- 
vealed his  brilliant  red  shock  of  hair,  his  freckled 
face  breaking  into  a  genial  grin. 

"  Hello,  you  red-hot  little  devil,"  he  greeted. 
"  I'm  glad  some  one  has  turned  up  with  redder 
hair  than  mine.    Brother — shake !  " 

Russ  looked  him  over  carefully. 

"  Don't  you  claim  no  relationship  with  me,  you 
sorrel  hyena,"  he  said.  "  I  won't  stand  it  for  a 
holy  second.  Get  a  move  on  and  help  me  snatch 
off  this  load." 

All  down  the  line  the  Three  Bar  men  were 
getting  acquainted  with  the  freighters,  introduc- 
tions effected  in  much  the  same  manner  as  that 
between  Russet  and  Moore.  A  thousand  pounds 
of  oats  were  tossed  from  the  top  of  the  first  wagon 
and  when  the  concealing  sacks  were  cleared  away 
there  were  three  heavy  plows  showing  under- 


146        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

neath,  the  spaces  between  them  filled  with  shin- 
ing coils  of  fence  wire.  The  second  load  consisted 
of  a  dismantled  drill,  a  crate  of  long-handled 
shovels,  and  more  barbed  wire;  the  third  held  a 
rake  and  a  mowing  machine,  more  wire,  kegs  of 
fence  staples  and  a  dozen  forks. 

"  The  Three  Bar  will  be  the  middle  point  of  a 
cyclone,"  Moore  prophesied  as  he  viewed  the  im- 
plements.    "  Just  as  soon  as  this  leaks  out." 

"  We  fetched  our  cyclone  openers  with  us," 
Russ  assured  him.     "  Let  her  buck." 

From  the  cook-shack  door  the  girl  viewed  these 
preparations,  then  turned  her  eyes  to  the  flat  and 
visioned  it  with  a  carpet  of  rippling  hay. 

There  was  a  clatter  of  hoofs  and  a  rattling  of 
gravel  as  five  horsemen  put  their  sure-footed 
mounts  down  the  steep  slope  two  hundred  yards 
back  of  the  house  and  followed  along  the  fence 
of  the  corral.  The  ^ve  Brandons  had  cut  across 
the  shoulder  of  the  mountain.  The  girl  wondered 
at  this  visit  as  she  heard  Lafe  Brandon,  the  fa- 
ther and  head  of  the  tribe,  ask  Harris  to  put  them 
up  for  the  night. 

An  hour  later  Harris  and  Lafe  came  to  her. 
door  and  she  let  them  in. 

"  The  Brandons  are  riding  down  to  file  on  a 
quarter  apiece,"  Harris  said.  "  Art  quit  the 
wagon  below  their  place  as  we  came  in  and  told 
the  rest  that  we're  going  to  farm  the  Three  Bar." 

"  Then  you're  doing  the  same? "  she  asked 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        147 

Laf  e  with  sudden  hope  that  her  brand  would  have 
company  in  the  move. 

Old  man  Brandon  shook  his  head, 

"  Not  right  off,"  he  said.  "  Until  we  see  how 
you  folks  pan  out.  We  can't  fix  to  handle  it  the 
way  you  do.  We're  filing  to  protect  ourselves 
before  some  nester  outfit  turns  up  at  our  front 
door." 

The  old  man  explained  his  views.  There  was 
enough  flow  in  the  stream  that  cut  their  home 
valley  to  water  something  over  a  section  of  land. 
With  that  filed  on  they  would  control  their  home 
range.  They  could  grade  up  their  cows  and  in- 
crease a  hundred  per  cent,  with  a  section  under 
hay.  He  hoped  the  Three  Bar  would  win,  but  he 
feared  to  start  in  the  face  of  the  wave  of  opposi- 
tion he  was  sure  would  rise  against  the  move. 

"  We're  not  fixed  for  it,"  he  explained  again. 

"  But  the  other  small  outfits  feel  the  same 
way,"  Harris  said.  "  If  two  of  us  start  the  rest 
will  join  in." 

"  Maybe  so,"  the  old  man  said  doubtfully. 
"  But  noways  likely.  They're  too  set  on  the 
other  side."  The  thought  was  deep-rooted  and 
he  could  not  be  moved. 

"  We'll  let  it  out  it's  only  for  protection  that 
we  all  are  filing,"  he  said.  "  And  that  we  don't 
aim  to  prove  up.  The  outfits  that  don't  file  now 
will  lose  out.  This  will  always  be  open  range, 
more  than  ninety  per  cent,  of  it,  and  those  who 


148        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

file  on  their  water  will  control  the  grass.  As  soon 
as  the  squatters  see  one  outfit  starting,  they'll 
take  out  papers  on  every  piece  of  dirt  they  can 
get  water  to.  They'll  have  six  months  to  move 
on,  then  a  six  months'  stay.  They'll  hang  round 
waiting  for  things  to  open  up  so  they  can  rush  in 
here.  The  brand  owners  who  haven't  hedged 
theirselves  beforehand  will  run  down  to  file  and 
find  that  nesters  have  had  papers  on  all  the 
good  pieces  right  in  their  dooryard  for  months. 
They'll  have  only  the  plots  left  that  their  home 
ranch  sets  on,  and  likely  no  water  even  for 
that." 

The  Brandons  stayed  for  the  night  and  rode 
off  at  daylight  the  next  morning,  while  the  Three 
Bar  men  prepared  for  a  trip  to  Brill's.  As  the 
rest  were  saddling  for  the  start  Harris  saw  old 
Rile  Foster  seated  by  himself,  gazing  off  across 
the  hills. 

"  Better  come  and  ride  over  with  us,  Rile,"  he 
urged.  "  Bangs  would  want  vou  to  try  and  for- 
get." 

The  old  man  shook  his  head, 

"  I'm  drifting  to-day,"  he  said.  "  I'll  likely  be 
back  before  long.  I  back-tracked  Blue  to  their 
camp  and  trailed  them  twenty  miles  to  where 
they  joined  another  bunch.  It  was  some  of  Har- 
per's devils — I  don't  know  which  four.  One  way/ 
or  another,  whether  I  get  the  right  four  or  not, 
I'm  going  to  play  even  for  Bangs." 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        149 

When  the  rest  of  the  men  rode  off  the  old  man 
was  still  leaning  against  the  shop. 

There  were  less  than  a  dozen  others  in  Brill's 
store  when  the  Three  Bar  men  crowded  through 
the  door.  Five  men  sat  at  one  of  the  tables  in  the 
big  room  and  indulged  in  a  casual  game  of  stud. 
Harper  and  Lang  were  among  them.  Two  of 
them  Harris  knew  as  men  named  Hopkins  and' 
Wade.    The  fifth  was  unknown  to  him. 

The  albino's  eyes  met  Harris's  steadily  as  he 
entered  at  the  head  of  the  Three  Bar  men.  Those 
among  the  hands  who  had  formerly  fraternized  as 
freely  with  Harper's  men  as  with  those  who  rode 
for  legitimate  outfits  now  held  way  from  them 
since  their  foreman  had  ordered  Harper  from  the 
Three  Bar  wagon.  They  merely  nodded  as  they 
filed  past  to  the  bar. 

"Who  is  the  man  dealing  now?"  Harris  in- 
quired of  Moore. 

The  freckled  youth  turned  to  the  card  players. 

"  Magill,"  he  said.    "  Same  breed  as  the  rest.** 

The  news  that  the  Three  Bar  had  turned  into 
a  squatter  outfit  had  been  widely  noised  abroad. 
Carpenter  had  stopped  at  Brill's  late  the  night 
before  and  announced  the  fact.  Others  had 
seemed  already  aware  of  it. 

From  behind  the  bar  Brill  covertly  studied  the 
man  who  was  responsible  for  this  change.  Four 
men  from  the  Half  moon  D  stood  grouped  at  one 
end  of  the  room.     They  split  up  and  mingled 


150        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

among  the  others.  Brill  moved  up  and  do^vn  be- 
hind the  bar,  polishing  it  with  a  towel.  One  after 
another  he  drew  each  of  the  men  from  the  Half- 
moon  D  into  conversation  with  the  Three  Bar 
foreman  to  determine  whether  or  not  they  re- 
sented his  move.  There  was  no  evidence  of  it  in 
their  speech.  They  had  all  been  present  when 
Harris  rode  the  blue  horse  and  had  heard  his 
subsequent  remark  to  Morrow.  There  was  but 
one  reference  to  the  state  of  affairs  at  the  Three 
Bar. 

"  Now  you've  gone  and  raised  hell,"  one  boy 
from  the  Halfmoon  D  remarked  to  Harris. 
"  You'll  have  folks  out  looking  for  your  scalp." 
He  lowered  his  voice  and  Brill  moved  nearer  to 
wipe  away  an  imaginary  spot  on  the  bar.  "  It's 
Slade  you'll  have  to  buck,"  the  boy  warned. 
"  There's  likely  to  be  some  excitement  over  in 
your  neighborhood.  I'd  like  right  well  to  ride 
for  the  Three  Bar  next  year.  Hold  a  job  for  me 
in  the  spring." 

The  men  from  the  two  outfits  mingled  as  un- 
restrainedly as  before  and  at  last  Harris  smiled 
across  at  Brill. 

"  Well,  have  you  sized  it  all  up?  "  he  asked. 

The  storekeeper  looked  up  quickly,  knowing 
that  Harris  had  read  his  purpose  in  drawing  him 
into  conversation  with  the  four  men.  He  pol- 
ished the  bar  thoughtfully,  then  nodded. 

"  A  man  in  my  business  has  to  keep  posted — 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        151 

both  ways,"  he  said.  "  I  just  wanted  to  make 
sure.  Five  years  ago  every  man  would  have  quit 
the  Three  Bar  like  a  snake — feeling  was  that 
strong.  But  the  boys  drift  from  place  to  place 
and  they've  seen  both  ends  of  it.  They  don't  give 
a  damn  one  way  or  the  other  now.  Why  should 
they?  They've  got  nothing  at  stake.  Five  years 
ago  you  couldn't  have  hired  a  man  to  ride  for 
you.  Now  they'll  be  pouring  in  asking  for  jobs 
— just  because  they  figure  there'll  be  some  ex- 
citement on  tap." 

The  men  from  the  Halfmoon  D  were  due  back 
and  inside  of  an  hour  they  rode  off,  leaving  only 
Harris's  men  and  the  five  card-players  in  the 
place.  Harris  walked  over  to  the  table  and  the 
Three  Bar  men  shifted  positions,  slouching  side- 
wise  at  the  bar  or  leaning  with  their  backs  to  it, 
alertly  watching  this  unexpected  move  as  the 
foreman  spoke  to  the  albino. 

"  Let's  you  and  I  draw  off  and  have  a  little 
talk,"  he  said.    "  If  you  can  spare  the  time." 

Harper  looked  up  at  him  in  silence.  He  care- 
fully tilted  up  the  corner  of  his  hole-card  and 
peeked  at  it,  then  turned  his  other  cards  face 
down  on  the  table. 

"  Pass,"  he  said,  and  rose  to  face  Harris. 
''  Lead  the  way." 

Harris  moved  over  to  another  table  and  the 
two  men  sat  down,  facing  each  other  across  it. 
He  motioned  to  Evans  and  Lanky  joined  them. 


152        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

Harris  plunged  abruptly  into  what  he  had  to 
say. 

"  First  off,  Harper,  I  want  you  to  get  it 
straight  that  I'm  not  fool  enough  to  threaten  you 
— for  I  know  you're  not  any  more  afraid  of  me 
than  I  am  of  you.  This  is  just  a  little  explaining, 
a  business  talk,  so  we'll  both  know  where  we 
stand.  It's  up  to  you  whether  we  let  each  other 
alone  or  fight." 

"  Good  start,"  the  albino  commented.  "  Go 
right  on." 

"  All  right — it's  like  this,"  Harris  resumed. 
"  I'm  going  to  have  my  hands  full  without  you 
hiring  out  to  pester  us.  I'm  not  out  to  reform 
the  country.  They  set  the  fashion  of  dog  eat 
dog  and  every  man  for  himself;  so  the  Three  Bar 
is  all  that  interests  me.  You  keep  out  of  my  af- 
fairs and  I'll  let  you  go  your  own  gait.  If  you 
mix  in  I'll  have  your  men  hunted  down  like  rats." 

Harper  glanced  toward  the  group  at  the  bar. 

"  You  were  prudent  enough  to  pick  a  time 
when  you're  three  to  one  to  tell  me  about  that," 
he  said.  "  If  I'd  kill  you  in  your  chair  I  might 
have  some  trouble  getting  out  the  door." 

"Of  course  I'd  take  every  chance  to  play  safe," 
Harris  admitted.  "  But  that  is  beside  the  point. 
I'd  have  told  you  the  same  thing  if  the  odds  had 
been  reversed." 

"  Would  you?  "  the  albino  j)ondered.  "  I 
wonder."  ' 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        1 53 

"You  know  I  would,"  Harris  stated. 
"  You've  got  brains,  or  you'd  have  been  dead  for 
twenty  years.  If  I  thought  you  were  a  haphazard 
homicide  I  woukki't  be  sitting  here.  But  you 
wouldn't  kill  a  man  without  looking  a  few  weeks 
ahead  and  making  sure  it  was  safe." 

"  Go  ahead — Let's  hear  the  rest  of  it,"  Harper 
urged.    "  You've  got  an  original  line  of  talk." 

"  You're  playing  one  game  and  I'm  playing 
mine,"  Harris  said.  "  You're  in  the  saddle  now 
— like  you  have  been  once  or  twice  before.  But 
you  know  that  the  sentiment  of  a  community  re- 
verses almost  overnight.  You've  stepped  out 
just  ahead  of  a  clean-up  a  time  or  two  in  the  past. 
You  know  how  it  goes — ^your  friends  drop  off 
like  you  had  the  plagTie.  Every  man's  out  after 
your  scalp.  I've  got  a  hard  bunch  of  terriers  over 
at  the  Three  Bar  and  you  couldn't  raid  us  with- 
out a  battle  big  enough  to  go  down  in  history  as 
the  Three  Bar  war.  Either  way  you'd  lose  for 
it  would  stir  folks  up — and  when  they're  stirred 
you're  through.  Do  you  remember  what  Al 
Moody  did  up  on  the  Gallatin  and  what  old  Con 
Ristine  sprung  on  the  Nations  Trail?  That  will 
happen  again  right  here." 

The  two  men  were  leaning  toward  each  other, 
elbows  resting  on  the  table.  Harper  relaxed  and 
leaned  back  comfortably  in  his  chair  as  he  twisted 
a  smoke.  Evans  propped  his  feet  on  the  table 
and  Harris  hung  one  knee  over  the  arm  of  his 


154        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

chair.  The  men  at  the  bar  knew  that  some  crisis 
had  been  safely  passed. 

"  You  talk  as  if  I  was  running  an  outfit  of  my 
o^\^  and  had  a  bunch  of  riders  that  could  swarm 
down  on  you,"  Harper  objected.  "  I  don't  even 
run  a  brand  of  my  own  or  have  one  man  riding 
for  me." 

"  The  wild  bunch  is  riding  for  you,"  Harris 
stated. 

"  Suppose  that  was  true,"  Harper  said. 
"Then  what?" 

"  In  one  country  after  the  next  they've  hit  the 
toboggan  whenever  they  got  to  feeling  too 
strong.  If  you  line  up  against  me  that  time  has 
come  again.  If  I  get  potted  from  the  brush  I've 
hedged  it  so  that  those  boys  that  filed  over  there 
won't  be  left  in  the  lurch.  There'll  be  a  reward 
of  a  thousand  dollars  hung  up  for  the  scalp  of 
each  of  fifteen  men  whose  names  I  gathered  while 
I  was  prowling  round — reliable  men  to  carry  on 
what  I've  begun;  and  marshals  thicker  than  flies 
to  protect  the  homestead  filings  on  the  Three 
Bar." 

"  Then  it  might  be  bad  policy  to  bushwhack 
you,"  Harper  observed. 

"  You  can  go  your  own  gait,"  Harris  said. 
"  As  long  as  you  lay  off  Three  Bar  cows.  You 
invited  me  one  time  to  come  down  to  your  hang- 
out in  the  Breaks.  I  won't  ever  make  that  visit 
unless  you  call  on  the  Three  Bar  first ;  then,  just 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        155 

out  of  politeness,  I'll  ride  over  at  the  head  of  a 
hundred  men." 

"  Then  it  don't  look  as  if  we'd  get  anywhere, 
visiting  back  and  forth,"  Harper  said. 

"  Now  don't  think  I'm  throwing  a  bluff  or 
threatening;  I'm  just  telling  you.  You  could  re- 
cite a  number  of  things  that  could  happen  to  me 
in  return — all  of  'em  true.  I'm  just  counting 
that  you've  got  brains  and  can  see  it's  not  going 
to  help  either  one  of  us  to  get  lined  up  wrong. 
What  do  you  say — shall  we  call  it  hands  off  be- 
tween the  Three  Bar  and  you?  " 

The  albino  half-closed  his  eyes,  the  pale  eye- 
balls glittering  through  the  slit  of  his  lids  as  he 
reflected  on  this  proposition,  tapping  a  careless 
finger  on  his  knee.  He  glanced  absent-mindedly 
toward  the  bar,  his  thoughts  wholly  occupied  with 
the  matter  in  hand.  A  pair  of  eyes  that  gazed 
back  at  him  drew  his  own  and  he  found  himself 
looking  at  Bentley,  the  man  who  repped  with  the 
Three  Bar  for  Slade.  The  albino's  suspicions 
were  as  fluid  and  easily  roused  as  those  of  a  beast 
of  prey  in  a  dangerous  neighborhood.  With  one 
of  those  quick  shifts  of  which  his  mind  was  capa- 
ble he  concentrated  every  mental  effort  toward 
linking  Bentley  with  some  unpleasant  episode  of 
the  past.  The  man  had  turned  away  and  Harper 
could  only  sense  a  vague  feeling  that  he  was  dan- 
gerous to  him,  without  definite  point  upon  which 
to  base  his  suspicions.    At  the  sound  of  Harris's 


156        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

voice  his  mind  made  another  lightning  shift  back 
to  the  present. 

"  Well?  "  Harris  asked. 

"  \VTiy,  if  I  had  anything  to  do  with  it,  like 
you  seem  to  think,  I'd  advise  against  our  bucking 
each  other,"  Harper  said.  "  I'd  try  to  get  along 
— and  declare  hands  off."  He  rose,  nodded  to 
the  two  men  and  returned  to  the  stud  game. 

"  He'll  do  it  too,"  Evans  predicted.  "  There's 
that  much  fixed  anyway — ^not  a  bad  piece  of 
work." 

The  two  men  returned  to  the  bar  and  Brill 
moved  close  to  Harris.  For  fifteen  years  he  had 
stood  behind  that  bar  and  observed  the  men  of 
the  whole  countryside  at  their  worst — and  best ; 
and  he  laiew  men.  As  well  as  if  he  had  heard 
the  words  of  the  three  at  the  table  he  knew  that 
Harris  and  Plarper  had  reached  an  agi'cement  of 
some  sort  that  was  satisfactory  to  both. 

"  Take  the  boys  over  a  drink  on  me,"  Harris 
said,  and  Brill  slid  a  bottle  and  five  whisky 
glasses  on  to  a  tray  and  moved  over  to  the 
table. 

"  Here's  a  drink  on  the  Three  Bar  boss,"  he 
announced. 

Lang  scowled,  remembering  the  recent  occa- 
sion when  Harris  had  ordered  them  off. 

"  To  hell  with "  he  commenced,  but  the 

albino  cut  him  short. 

"  Drink  it,"  he  said. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        157 

Ten  minutes  later  the  five  men  rose  to  go. 
Harris  looked  at  his  watch. 

"  I'm  off,"  he  said  to  Evans.  "  Try  and  get 
the  boys  home  by  to-morrow  morning  if  it's  pos- 
sible." 

He  went  outside  and  mounted  as  the  five 
rustlers  swung  to  their  saddles. 

"  I'm  going  your  way  as  far  as  the  forks,"  he 
said  to  Harper. 

The  Three  Bar  men  were  treated  to  the  sight 
of  their  foreman  riding  down  the  road  beside 
Harper  at  the  head  of  four  of  the  worst  ruffians 
in  the  State. 

And  behind  the  bar  Brill  moved  softly  back 
and  forth  when  not  serving  drinks,  pausing  op- 
posite first  one  group  and  then  the  next  to  dab  at 
the  polished  wood  with  his  cloth,  listening  care- 
fully to  the  conversation  and  gauging  it  to  de- 
termine whether  the  apparent  sentiment  toward 
the  squatter  foreman  was  sincere  or  would  prove 
different  when  the  men,  flushed  with  undiluted 
rye,  were  unrestrained  by  his  presence.  At  one 
end  of  the  bar  Evans  and  Bentley  conversed  to- 
gether in  low  tones  but  whenever  Brill  strolled 
casually  to  their  end  the  conference  lagged.  The 
few  sentences  which  reached  his  ears  were  of  triv- 
ial concern. 


IX 

There  was  a  new  contentment  in  the  eyes  of 
the  Three  Bar  girl  as  she  sat  her  horse  beside 
Carlos  Deane  and  looked  off  down  the  bottoms. 
A  haze  of  smoke  drifted  above  the  little  valley 
of  the  Crazy  Loop.  Three  mule  outfits  were 
steadily  ripping  up  the  sage  flats.  Men  lifted 
the  uprooted  brush  on  forks  and  piled  it  for  the 
burning.  The  two  rode  down  to  the  fields  with 
the  pungent  sage  smoke  drifting  in  their  faces. 
Harris  joined  them,  a  smudge  of  fire-black  across 
his  forehead,  and  swept  his  arm  across  the  stretch 
of  plowed  ground. 

"  Can  you  picture  that  covered  with  a  stand  of 
alfalfa  hay?  "  he  asked. 

The  girl  nodded. 

"  Yes — and  cut  and  cured  and  in  the  stack 
yards,"  she  said.  "  And  a  straight  red  run  of 
Three  Bar  cows  wintering  under  fence." 

Harris  wondered  if  her  new  contentment  came 
wholly  from  the  progress  the  Three  Bar  was 
making  or  was  derived  partly  from  the  presence 
of  Carlos  Deane.  Each  man  had  recognized  the 
other  as  a  contender  for  the  love  of  the  Three  Bar 
girl  and  during  the  two  days  of  Deane's  stay  each 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        159 

one  had  been  covertly  sizing  and  estimating  the 
caliber  of  the  other  man. 

"  The  opposite  faction  hasn't  succeeded  in 
wrecking  the  Three  Bar  up  to  date,"  Deane  said. 
"  It's  probable  they  see  you're  too  strong  for 
them." 

"  It's  hard  to  wreck  plowed  ground,"  Harris 
pointed  out.  "  And  that's  all  they  have  to  work 
on  right  now;  not  a  fence  to  tear  up,  a  stack  to 
fire  or  any  gi-owing  crops  to  trample  do^vn.  All 
they  can  do  right  now  is  to  wait.  It  must  be 
wearing.  But  sooner  or  later  they'll  show  their 
teeth." 

For  a  month  prior  to  Deane's  arrival  Harris 
had  been  occupied  from  dawn  till  dark  with  the 
details  of  the  new  work.  The  wagons  had  made 
a  week's  trip  to  the  railroad  to  freight  in  more 
implements  and  supplies.  A  hundred  acres  of 
plowed  ground  lay  mellowing  under  the  sun. 
Five  miles  back  up  the  slope  of  the  hills  two  men 
worked  in  a  valley  of  lodgepole  pine,  felling, 
trimming  and  peeling  sets  of  matched  logs  for 
the  cabins  that  must  be  erected  on  each  filing. 
The  cowhands  were  out  working  the  range  in 
pairs,  branding  late-dropped  calves  and  moving 
drifted  stock  back  to  the  home  range.  Forty 
white-face  bulls  had  been  trail-herded  from  the 
railroad  and  thrown  out  along  the  foot  of  the 
hills  to  replace  the  other  bulls  that  had  been 
rounded  up  and  brought  in.     These  old  stags 


i6o        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

now  gTazed  in  the  big  pasture  lot  until  such  time 
as  the  beef  herd  should  be  gathered  and  shipped. 
In  a  few  more  days  the  boys  would  come  in  from 
the  range  and  gather  at  the  home  ranch,  pre- 
paratory to  going  out  once  more  on  the  beef 
round-up. 

"  I'm  about  to  take  a  vacation,"  Harris  said. 
"  The  ranger  is  coming  over  to  mark  out  some 
more  trees  for  us  and  to  run  the  U.  S.  brand  on 
the  logs  we've  already  cut.  I'm  going  back  up 
in  the  hills  with  him  to  sort  out  a  valley  or  two 
for  summer  range." 

"  We  don't  need  any  extra  range  now,"  Billie 
said.  "  Why  pay  grazing  fees  before  we  need 
the  room." 

"Just  to  get  our  wedge  in  first,"  Harris  ex- 
plained. "  We  can  get  grazing  permits  on  the 
Forest  now — right  in  the  best  grass  valleys. 
Each  year  we'll  throw  some  cows  up  there  to  hold 
our  rights.  There'll  always  be  good  grass  on  the 
Forest  Reserves  for  they  won't  permit  overstock- 
ing. The  day  will  come  when  we'll  be  glad 
to  have  permits  to  summer-feed  a  thousand 
or  so  head  on  the  Forest.  I  was  thinking 
maybe  you  and  Deane  would  like  to  make  the 
jaunt." 

"  We'll  go,"  the  girl  decided. 

"  It's  a  question  of  time,"  Deane  said.  "  How 
long  will  we  be  gone?  " 

"  We'll  start  in  an  hour  or  two,"  Harris  said. 


J 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        i6i 

"  Just  as  soon  as  Wilton  turns  up.  We'll  only 
be  gone  five  days  at  the  most." 

"  Then  I'll  stretch  my  stay  to  cover  it,"  Deane 
accepted.  "  I'd  certainly  hate  to  pass  up  a 
chance  for  a  trip  in  the  hills." 

"  We'll  ride  back  and  make  up  an  extra  bed 
roll,"  Harris  said.  "  Then  we'll  be  all  set  to  start 
when  Wilton  shows  up." 

Calico  had  sidled  off  the  plowing  and  was  crop- 
ping the  gTass  at  the  edge  of  it.  As  Harris 
moved  toward  him  Evans  rode  down  the  right- 
hand  slope  and  the  three  waited  for  him. 

"  Moore  and  I  were  working  in  close  and  I 
thought  I'd  ride  over  to  tell  you  that  the  wild 
bunch  has  lost  a  veteran,"  he  said.  "  Some  one 
put  Barton  out  over  in  the  Breaks." 

Barton,  whose  name  was  linked  with  that  of 
Harper,  had  been  found  with  a  rifle  ball  through 
his  chest.  His  own  gim,  found  by  his  out- 
stretched hand,  had  showed  one  blackened  cylin- 
der, the  empty  shell  sufficient  proof  that  he  had 
fired  a  single  shot  at  his  assailant. 

"  Anyway,  he  had  a  chance  to  see  who  got 
him,"  Lanky  philosophized.  "  He  was  likely  or- 
dered to  turn  round — given  a  fighting  chance 
maybe." 

The  girl  could  find  no  sorrow  in  her  heart  over 
the  passing  of  Barton  but  there  was  an  uneasy 
feeling  deep  within  her, — a  vague  suspicion  that 
she  should  be  able  to  pronounce  the  killer's  name. 


i62        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

This  elusive  thought  was  crowded  from  her  mind 
when  the  ranger  rode  up  to  the  Three  Bar  ac- 
companied by  Slade,  each  man  leading  a  pack 
horse. 

"  Slade's  going  to  look  over  a  little  territory 
uj>  on  the  Forest,"  Wilton  explained.  "  So  we 
can  get  it  all  done  on  one  trip." 

There  was  no  way  to  avoid  this  unexpected  ad- 
dition to  their  party.  Harris  and  the  ranger 
packed  the  three  bed  rolls  and  Billie's  teepee 
along  with  the  necessary  equipment  and  in  half 
an  hour  the  little  cavalcade  filed  up  a  gulch  back 
of  the  Three  Bar,  the  ranger  in  the  lead  with  his 
pack  horse.  The  other  pack  animals  followed 
and  the  three  other  men  and  the  girl  brought  up 
the  rear  in  single  file.  By  noon  they  made  the 
first  rims  and  followed  over  into  a  rolling  coun- 
try, heavily  timbered  in  the  main.  In  the  early 
evening  they  rode  out  on  to  a  low  divide  and 
Blind  Valley  showed  below  them,  a  broad  ex- 
panse of  open  grassland.  A  little  stream 
threaded  the  bottoms  and  its  winding  course  was 
marked  by  thickets  of  birch.  In  places  it  dis- 
appeared under  the  leafy  tunnels  of  aspen  groves, 
their  pale  silvery  trunks  and  leaves  contrasting 
with  the  heavy  blue-green  of  an  occasional  water- 
spruce.  In  a  narrowing  of  the  valley  it  was 
choked  from  wall  to  wall  by  a  cottonwood  jungle, 
opening  out  once  more  into  wide  meadows  im- 
mediately below  the  neck.    Long  open  parks  ex-» 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        163 

tended  their  tongues  well  back  up  the  timbered 
sidehills. 

"Feed!"  Harris  said.  "Feed.  Worlds  of 
it." 

They  angled  down  the  slope  and  struck  the 
rank  grass  of  the  bottoms, — ^mountain  hay  in 
which  the  horses  stood  knee-deep.  They  made 
camp  at  the  mouth  of  a  branching  canyon,  just 
within  the  timber.  The  ranger  threw  the  horses 
up  this  side  gulch  while  Harris  felled  a  dead  pine 
and  kindled  a  fire.  When  the  ranger  returned 
he  picketed  one  horse  in  the  heavy  grass  while 
Slade  pitched  Billie's  teepee  under  a  spruce.  The 
meal  was  finished,  dishes  washed  and  the  five  sat 
round  a  fire. 

Harris  sensed  Deane's  attitude  toward  it  all 
for  he  knew  something  of  the  other  man's  way  of 
life.  Those  with  whom  Deane  was  thrown  most 
in  contact  were  careful  of  appearances.  It  was 
unheard-of  in  his  code  that  a  girl  should  jaunt  for 
days  accompanied  by  four  men.  Here  appear- 
ances seemed  entirely  disregarded  and  no  one 
gave  the  matter  a  thought. 

The  moon  swimg  over  the  ridges  and  shed  its 
radiance  over  Blind  Valley.  Deane  motioned  to 
Billie  and  the  girl  rose  and  followed  him  to  the 
edge  of  the  timber  where  they  sat  on  a  blow- 
down. 

"  Billie,  let  me  take  you  away  from  all  this,"  he 
urged.    "  All  this  hard  riding  and  rough  man's 


i64        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

work.  Let  me  give  you  the  things  that  will  shut 
out  all  the  hardships.  What's  the  use  of  going 
on  like  this?" 

The  girl  was  conscious  of  a  vague  sense  of  dis- 
appointment. Deane  was  an  active  figure  in  the 
business  life  of  his  own  community  and  she  had 
felt  some  pride  in  the  fact  that  when  he  should 
come  to  the  Three  Bar  he  would  find  that  she  too 
was  doing  real  work  in  the  world.  She  reflected 
that  his  attitude  was  that  of  so  many  other  men, 
his  idea  of  love  synonymous  with  shelter  for  the 
object  of  it,  and  his  main  plea  was  that  of  provid- 
ing her  with  shelter  against  all  the  rough  corners 
of  life.  Shelter!  And  what  she  wanted  was  to 
be  part  of  things — to  have  a  hand  in  running  her 
o\\Ti  affairs.  It  came  to  her  that  of  all  men  per- 
haps Slade  understood  her  the  best. 

"I  don't  want  shelter!"  she  said.  "And  I 
can't  think  of  anything  else  till  after  the  Three 
Bar  is  a  going  concern." 

The  voices  of  the  three  men  round  the  fire 
drifted  to  them. 

"  Listen,"  she  urged. 

"  Blind  Valley  ought  to  summer-feed  three 
hundred  head,"  the  ranger  was  saying.  "  I'll 
recommend  permits  for  that  many  cows." 

"  That'll  suit  me,"  Slade  nodded.  "  I'll  put  in 
application  through  you?  " 

"  Not  if  I  can  help  it  you  won't,"  Harris  said. 
"  Why  should  you  have  permits  right  in  the  back 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        165 

yard  of  the  Three  Bar  with  all  the  rest  of  the  hills 
open  to  you?  There's  a  natural  lead  right  down 
to  the  corrals ;  divides  to  form  wings.  It's  up  to 
Wilton,  of  course,  but  I'm  going  to  make  appli- 
cation to  graze  Blind  Valley  myself.  They'll 
allow  whichever  one  he  recommends." 

"  Harris  has  first  call,"  the  ranger  stated 
mildly.  "  This  is  the  logical  range  for  his  stuff — 
this  and  one  or  two  others  right  close.  We  can 
fix  you  up  in  a  dozen  other  good  grass  countries 
further  on,  Slade,  if  it's  all  the  same." 

Slade  nodded  agreement.  The  ranger  had 
authority  to  recommend  the  issuing  of  permits 
and  his  superiors  would  not  go  contrary  to  his 
suggestions  in  any  but  exceptional  cases — cer- 
tainly not  in  this  matter.  Blade's  eyes  turned 
frequently  toward  the  two  figures  on  the  log, 
silhouetted  against  the  white  of  the  moonlit 
meadow,  and  his  slashed  mouth  set  in  disapproval. 
Harris  noted  this  and  smiled  as  it  occurred  to 
him  that  Blade's  views  on  the  subject  of  Deane's 
appropriating  the  girl  for  himself  were  about  on 
a  par  with  Deane's  ideas  relative  to  her  touring 
the  hills  with  four  men. 

The  two  came  back  and  sat  with  the  others 
round  the  dying  fire,  then  all  turned  in  for  the 
night,  Billie  in  her  teepee  and  the  men  in  their 
bed  rolls  with  no  other  overhead  shelter  than  the 
trees.  In  less  than  an  hour  Harris  raised  on  one 
elbow.    The  ranger  woke  just  as  Harris  slipped 


i66        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

from  his  bed  roll  and  tugged  on  his  chaps.  The 
steady  thud  of  hoofs  had  penetrated  each  man's 
consciousness  and  apprised  him  of  the  fact  that 
the  horses  were  coming  down. 

Wilton  closed  his  eyes  as  Harris  departed  to 
head  them  back.  Three  times  during  the  night 
Deane  was  roused  as  one  or  the  other  of  the  three 
men  left  his  bed  roll  to  frustrate  an  attempt  of 
the  horses  to  make  a  break  for  home.  Near 
morning  he  was  once  more  wakened  by  a  clammy 
dampness  on  his  face.  A  fine  drizzle  was  falling. 
Slade  was  on  his  feet,  shoving  a  few  sticks  of 
wood  inside  the  flap  of  Billie's  teepee. 

In  the  first  gray  light  of  morning  Harris  was 
up  and  slicing  shavings  from  the  few  dry  sticks 
Slade  had  so  thoughtfully  tucked  away.  Break- 
fast was  cooked  under  the  dripping  trees.  The 
ranger  was  soaked  to  the  knees  as  he  waded 
through  the  tall  grass  to  the  picketed  horse.  He 
saddled  him  and  went  up-country  after  the  other 
horses.  The  outfit  was  packed  up  and  the 
little  procession  filed  away  toward  the  next  val- 
ley— and  Carlos  Deane  proved  his  real  caliber  to 
Harris. 

Throughout  the  day  they  rode  in  a  fine  drizzle; 
in  the  timber  the  wet  branches  whipped  them  and 
sprayed  water  down  the  necks  of  their  slickers; 
in  the  boggy  meadows  of  the  bottoms  the  mos- 
quitoes hovered  round  them  in  humming  swarms. 
The  horses  stamped,  shook  their  heads  angrily 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        167 

and  switched  their  tortured  flanks  with  dripping 
tails  till  at  last  the  men  gi-eased  their  noses,  eyes 
and  flanks  to  protect  the  animals  from  the  sing- 
ing horde.  When  they  dismounted  to  lead  their 
horses  up  precipitous  game  trails  leading  to  the 
crest  of  some  divide  Deane's  Angora  chaps 
flapped  like  dead  weights  and  seemed  to  drag 
him  back.  From  the  lofty  ridges  they  gazed 
down  upon  white  clouds  floating  in  the  valleys; 
and  at  night  they  made  camp  and  slept  in  damp 
])ed  rolls  with  the  clammy  mist  chilling  them. 
The  next  day  was  the  same. 

Harris  knew  that  a  man  might  evidence  great 
courage  in  the  face  of  danger,  risk  his  life  in  the 
heat  of  excitement,  but  that  the  true  test  of  iron 
control  is  to  experience  grinding  discomfort  and 
smile.  Deane's  neck  was  raw  and  chafed  from 
the  wet  neckband  of  his  flannel  shirt  and  his 
hands  and  cheeks  were  puffed  with  the  bites 
of  the  buzzing  pests.  But  Deane  had  been 
cheerful  throughout  and  had  uttered  no  com- 
plaint. 

Toward  evening  of  the  second  gloomy  day 
Harris  rode  up  beside  him. 

"  You'll  do,"  he  said. 

"  How's  that? "  Deane  asked. 

"  There's  maybe  one  man  out  of  every  two 
hundred  that  can  go  along  like  this  and  not  get 
to  blaming  every  one  in  sight  for  what's  happen- 
ing to  him.     I  don't  know  as  I'd  have  blamed  you 


i68        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

any  if  you'd  been  cussing  us  all  out  for  the  past 
two  days." 

Deane  laughed  and  shook  his  head. 

"  I've  been  rather  enjoying  it,"  he  said. 

"  You're  just  a  plain,  old-fashioned  liar, 
Deane,"  Harris  returned.  "  You  haven't  been 
enjoying  it  any  more  than  the  rest  of  us — which 
is  mighty  little ;  but  you've  got  insides  enough  to 
let  on  like  it's  considerable  sport — which  is  a 
whole  lot." 

"  No  one  else  has  done  any  beefing,"  Deane 
said.    "So  why  should  I?" 

"  This  is  everyday  business  with  us,"  Harris 
pointed  out.  "  And  right  unusual  for  you. 
There's  likely  a  number  of  things  you  do  every 
day  back  your  way,  but  that  doesn't  signify  that 
I  could  amble  back  there  and  perform  as  well  as 
you." 

"  I  suspect  you'd  make  out  all  right,"  Deane 
said.  "  Anyway — I'm  much  obliged  for  the  en- 
dorsement." 

They  camped  again  in  the  drizzle  but  by  noon 
of  the  following  day  the  sun  peeped  through.  In 
an  hour  every  cloud  and  fogbank  had  been  dis- 
persed with  a  rapidity  which  is  seen  only  in  the 
hill  country.  The  ranger  pulled  up  his  horse  as 
they  struck  a  game  trail  in  the  saddle  of  a  low 
divide.  A  bunch  of  shod  horses  had  been  over 
it  a  few  hours  past. 

"  Some  of  the  albino's  lavout,"  Wilton  siir- 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        169 

mised.  "  They  cross  through  here  to  that  camp 
of  theirs  down  in  the  Breaks.  IVe  run  across 
their  trails  up  here  before." 

They  rode  out  on  to  a  spur  and  looked  down  on 
the  low  country.  Slade  and  the  ranger  were  go- 
ing on,  the  others  returning  to  the  Three  Bar. 
Harris  pointed  to  the  country  spread  out  below 
them. 

"  That's  the  Breaks,"  he  told  Deane.  "  I'll 
point  out  the  albino's  stronghold." 

"  While  they're  looking  I  want  to  talk  to  you," 
Slade  said  to  Billie. 

"  Let's  get  together,"  he  said,  when  the  others 
had  passed  on.  "  Why  are  you  so  dead  set  on 
making  a  squatter  outfit  of  the  Three  Bar? 
Don't  you  know  the  nesters  will  flock  in  here  and 
cut  the  range  all  up  as  soon  as  they  see  a  chance?  " 

"  Not  my  range,"  she  said.  "  Outside  of  the 
V  L  and  the  Halfmoon  D  there's  not  another 
site  they  can  get  water  for,  except  maybe  a  couple 
of  spring  gulches  where  flood  reservoirs  will  hold 
back  enough  to  water  a  forty.  So  we'll  still  con- 
trol our  home  range." 

"  But  there's  a  dozen  sites  down  in  my  range," 
he  said. 

"  And  a  dozen  small  outfits  wouldn't  run  any 
more  cows  than  you  do  now,"  she  said.  "  At 
least  not  on  my  range;  so  what  difference  will  it 
make  to  me?  WTiy  don't  you  have  men  file  on  all 
those  sites?" 


lyo        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  You  can't  make  a  contract  that  will  hold  a 
man  to  turn  over  his  homestead  after  it's  proved 
up,"  he  said.  "  Half  of  them  would  keep  their 
land." 

"  Of  course,"  she  agreed.  "  But  then  you'd 
have  half  instead  of  nothing  at  all.  Do  you  want 
the  world? " 

"  I  want  you!  "  he  said.  "  Throw  in  with  me, 
girl.  I'm  going  to  fight  these  nesters  off — the 
Three  Bar  among  the  rest  if  you  don't  quit.  I'll 
smash  the  Three  Bar  into  mincemeat  unless  you 
run  this  damned  Harris  off  and  quit  this 
game." 

It  was  the  first  time  Slade  had  ever  threatened. 
Her  spirits  had  soared  over  the  prospects  of  the 
Three  Bar  and  she  was  suddenly  afraid  for  her 
brand  if  Slade,  who  had  whittled  down  a  dozen 
outfits  at  once,  should  suddenly  turn  his  whole 
attention  to  the  Three  Bar. 

"  I've  got  it  to  do,"  Slade  stated.  "  Since 
you've  started  this  deal  there's  been  nesters  filed 
papers  on  every  good  site  in  my  range,  waiting  to 
rush  in  as  soon  as  I  lose  my  grip.  Do  you  think 
I'll  let  them  crowd  me  out?  Not  in  a  thousand 
years!  I'm  telling  you — I'll  break  the  Three 
Bar  if  you  keep  it  up." 

"  All  right! "  she  said.  "  And  what  about  the 
homestead  laws?  " 

"  I'm  the  law  out  here,"  he  asserted. 

It  came  to  her  that  Slade  was  fiffhtinff  on  the 


Ji 


"I  want   you!"   he   said.     "Throw  in  with  me,  girl.' 
Page  170. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        171 

defensive,  that  he  feared  to  let  the  Three  Bar 
succeed  and  set  uj)  a  precedent  in  defiance  of  the 
signs  that  dotted  the  range. 

"  Then  it's  war! "  she  said.  "  And  you'll  go 
under  yourself,  from  your  own  size,  if  you 
haven't  the  judgment  to  hedge  yourself  now  like 
the  rest.  The  Three  Bar  is  going  ahead — and 
we're  going  to  win." 

She  turned  her  horse  but  Slade  caught  her 
arm  and  whirled  her  around.  He  jerked  a  thumb 
at  the  two  men  down  the  ridge. 

"  What  can  Deane,  a  half-baked  boy,  give 
you?  "  he  demanded.  "  Money — and  trinkets  to 
hang  all  over  you  till  you  flash  like  a  Mexican's 
bridle;  a  flower  garden  and  a  soft  front  lawn  to 
range  in — and  after  a  year  or  two  you'd  give  your 
soul  to  trade  it  off  for  an  acre  of  raw  sage.  You'd 
trade  a  castle  full  of  glittering  chandeliers  for 
one  hour  at  the  round-up  fire — your  box  at  the 
opera  for  a  seat  on  the  ground  with  your  back 
against  the  chuck-wagon  wheel  while  the  boys 
sang  just  one  old  song.  I  know!  You'd  soon 
gat  fed  up  on  too  much  of  that.  You  want  an 
outfit  of  your  own.  I'll  give  you  that — the  big- 
gest in  the  State." 

She  shook  her  head  without  answering. 

"  Then  I'll  break  you,"  he  predicted  a  second 
time.  He  drew  a  folded  slip  of  paper  from  ins 
pocket  and  held  it  out  to  her.  "  That's  the  ex- 
change slip,"  he  said.    "  It  calls  for  three  hun«* 


172        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

dred  odd  head  of  mixed  stuff.  You  can  send 
yours  over  any  time."  He  turned  his  horse  and 
followed  after  the  ranger  while  the  girl  joined 
Harris  and  Deane. 

Harris  had  slipped  the  strap  of  his  glasses  and 
handed  them  to  Deane  who  had  dismounted  and 
was  peering  off  at  the  spot  Harris  had  pointed 
out.  A  few  scattered  shacks,  showing  as  toy 
houses  from  the  distance,  stood  in  the  center  of  a 
broad  open  basin,  sheltered  on  all  sides  by  the 
choppy  mass  of  the  Breaks.  A  solid  corral,  al- 
most a  stockade,  stood  near  the  buildings  and  a 
few  white  points  indicated  that  a  teepee  or  two 
had  been  pitched  along  its  edge. 

"  That's  Arnold's  stockade,"  Harris  explained 
to  Deane.  "Arnold  was  an  old-time  rustler  that 
finished  at  the  end  of  a  rope  fifteen  years  ago. 
Now  all  the  drifters  in  the  country  stop  over  here 
if  they  want  a  place  to  hole  up." 

Deane  had  been  striving  to  fathom  the  attitude 
of  a  community  where  the  thieves  were  known  as 
such,  their  headquarters  a  matter  of  common 
knowledge,  and  yet  allowed  to  carry  on  their 
trade. 

"  Can't  the  sheriff  clean  them  out  of  there? " 
he  asked. 

"  He  could,"  Harris  said.  "  But  no  man  will 
make  a  complaint.  They  can  rustle  eveiy  steer 
in  the  country  and  the  losers  are  afraid  to  make 
a  report.    Every  outfit  is  supposed  to  protect  its 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        173 

own.  If  Alden  should  ride  up  to  almost  any 
ranch  within  a  hundred  miles  and  ask  them  if 
xhey'd  missed  any  stock  in  the  last  three  years 
they'd  shake  their  heads  and  swear  that  they 
hadn't  lost  a  hoof.  But  the  Three  Bar  has  a  clean 
page ;  we're  not  afraid  he'll  get  a  line  on  us  while 
we're  having  him  round  up  some  one  else.  The 
first  time  we  get  a  scrap  of  real  evidence  on  any 
man  we'll  call  Alden  in." 

"  You  told  me  the  Three  Bar  herds  have  been 
cut  in  half,"  Deane  said.  "  How  much  evidence 
do  you  need? " 

"It's  like  this:"  Harris  explained.  "We'd 
have  to  make  a  specific  charge  against  a  few  men 
— ^name  them  in  connection  with  some  raid.  That 
nest  down  there  is  only  a  sort  of  stoppmg  place. 
There's  twenty  or  so  that  use  it  on  and  off. 
Maybe  the  very  men  we'd  name  would  be  in  Cold- 
river  or  some  other  place  and  could  prove  it. 
Even  if  they  couldn't  we  couldn't  get  a  man  to 
testify.  Then  too,  rustling  is  about  the  hardest 
thing  in  the  world  to  prove.  There's  a  dozen 
\vays  they  can  work  it.  I  could  catch  some  of 
them  driving  a  bunch  of  Three  Bar  cows  toward 
the  Idaho  line.  They'd  look  up  and  see  me  and 
ealmly  ride  on  past  the  cows.  Thej'^  could  say 
the  bunch  was  just  drifting  ahead  of  their  horses 
— that  they  weren't  driving  them  at  all.  Who 
can  prove  a  case  of  rustling  even  if  you  see  it, 
imless  you  actually  catch  one  altering  a  brand — 


174        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

which  they  wouldn't  do  anywhere  withm  a  hun- 
dred miles  of  that  brand's  range." 

"  Then  how  will  you  ever  convict  one?  "  Deane 
asked. 

"  The  only  way  to  convict  a  rustler  right  now 
is  to  kill  him  and  swear  that  you  run  up  on  him 
changing  a  brand,"  Harris  said.  **  I  expect 
that's  what  we'll  have  to  do." 

Deane  looked  at  the  girl  to  determine  how  she 
met  this  suggestion.  Instead  of  the  shiver  of  dis- 
taste which  he  rather  expected  her  lips  were 
pressed  tight. 

"  A  little  of  that  would  help  Slade  too,"  she 
said.  "  He  told  me  just  now  that  he'd  smash  the 
Three  Bar." 

The  man  reflected  that  this  sort  of  a  life  could 
not  help  but  wear  off  some  of  her  natural  fineness 
and  harden  her. 

They  followed  the  rims  till  they  had  cleared  the 
Breaks,  then  angled  down  to  the  foothills  and 
headed  for  the  Three  Bar.  They  held  a  steady 
gait  until  a  half  hour  after  sunset  and  camped  in 
the  open  near  a  tiny  spring.  Again  Deane  was 
impressed  with  the  impropriety  of  the  girl's  be- 
ing out  with  two  men  who  loved  her  and  the 
thought  was  an  ache  that  remained  with  him.  It 
was  a  natural  reaction, — the  lifelong  training  to 
guard  against  appearances  which  were  open  to 
criticism  as  religiously  as  against  the  accom 
plished  fact. 


d 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        175 

As  they  sat  round  the  little  fire  the  girl 
handed  Harris  the  paper  Slade  had  given  her. 
It  was  a  scrawled  bill  of  sale  calling  for  three 
liundred  odd  head  of  Circle  P  cows,  listed  in  the 
exact  numbers  of  all  ages  and  sexes.  In  return 
she  would  send  him  an  exchange  slip  for  the  same 
number  of  Three  Bar  stock,  ^his  exchange  sys- 
tem was  one  of  Slade's  own  devising,  intended  to 
(eliminate  the  time  and  expense  of  sending  riders 
to  scour  adjacent  ranges  in  search  of  drifted 
stock.  Each  outfit  exchanged  slips  based  on  the 
round-up  tally  with  every  other  brand  and  so 
(•ould  show  bill  of  sale  for  off -brand  stuff  in  their 
beef  shipments  or  for  any  rebrands  on  the 
range. 

"  This  labor-saving  device  is  Slade's  trump 
card,"  Harris  said.  "  It  works  all  his  way.  We 
couldn't  turn  in  a  false  report.  But  he  has  three 
( rews  covering  his  range,  each  under  a  different 
wagon  foreman  and  no  one  of  them  wise  to  what 
the  rest  are  doing.  It's  only  the  foremen  that  jot 
down  the  daily  tallies  and  keep  the  final  score. 
l^ven  if  they  talked  among  themselves,  why, 
they're  all  riding  for  Slade's  brand — and  there 
you  are." 

Deane  was  regarding  the  penciled  memoran- 
dum signed  by  Slade. 

"Not  a  very  impressive  document,"  he  ob- 
served. 

Harris  laughed  at  the  other's  evident  disap- 


176        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

proval  of  such  a  slipshod  method  of  property 
transfer. 

"  Not  very,"  he  agreed.  "  But  it's  absohitely 
good.  You  could  borrow  money  against  that  at 
the  bank.  He  doesn't  get  us  that  way  but  here's 
how  he  does :  He's  mapped  out  a  rebrand  system. 
His  rebrand  is  Triangle  on  the  hip.  When  he 
gets  our  exchange  slip  all  he  has  to  do  is  go  on 
his  range  and  run  the  Triangle  on  the  hip  of  the 
number  of  Three  Bar  stock  it  calls  for.  There 
are  Three  Bar  cows  ranging  a  hundred  miles 
from  here,  just  as  there's  brands  a  hundred  miles 
off  whose  stock  turns  up  here — with  a  Triangle 
on  the  hip.  Who's  going  to  check  Slade  up?  It 
would  take  three  crews  to  cover  his  range  and 
tally  the  fresh  Three  Bar  rebrands  of  this  one 
season — a  few  here  and  a  few  there.  He  ships 
trainloads  of  cows  in  a  year.  There's  some  old 
rebrands  in  each  lot,  say;  maybe  more  than  last 
year's  exchange.  Well  he  simply  has  been  hold- 
ing them  over.  He  can  easy  explain  that.  It 
would  break  a  small  outfit  to  hire  enough  hands 
to  cover  his  range  and  check  him  up — and  he'd 
buy  part  of  those.  The  albino's  men  are  petty- 
larceny  bandits  compared  with  Slade." 

Deane  turned  to  the  girl. 

"  Billie,  why  don't  you  get  out  of  a  game  where 
everything  is  crooked — a  game  of  who  can  steal 
the  most  and  every  man  for  himself?  "  he  asked. 

"  Why  don't  you  fold  your  hands  and  give  up 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        177 

your  business  the  first  thing  that  goes  wrong? " 
she  countered.  "  Instead  of  trying  to  remedy 
it?" 

"  But  you  don't  have  to  do  it,"  he  urged. 

"  Neither  do  you,"  she  said.  "  I've  the  same 
pride  in  the  Three  Bar  that  you  have  in  anything 
you've  helped  build  uj).  You'd  fight  all  the 
harder  for  one  of  your  schemes  that  was  hard- 
pressed — and  so  would  I." 

She  turned  to  her  teepee  and  ended  the  discus- 
sion, her  pride  a  little  hurt  that  Deane  should  so 
little  appreciate  her  work — and  the  spirit  that 
made  her  hold  on  instead  of  giving  up. 

That  evening  they  rode  up  to  the  Three  Bar 
just  as  Waddles  announced  the  evening  meal. 

"She's  hot!"  the  big  voice  wailed.  "She's 
re-e-ed  hot ! " 

The  hands  were  gathering  at  the  ranch,  coming 
in  from  the  range  for  a  frolic  before  the  beef 
round-up  should  keep  out  for  another  month. 
Deane's  time  was  up  and  he  had  planned  to  leave 
on  the  following  day. 

"  You  can't  do  that,"  Harris  said.  "  Two 
more  days  for  you.  I've  given  orders  not  to  let 
vou  off  the  place  till  after  the  dance  at  Brill's. 
This  is  Tuesday  and  the  big  frolic  will  be  staged 
Thursday  night.    Then  you're  free  to  go." 

Deane  shook  his  head  and  prepared  to  offer  an 
excuse  but  Harris  smilingly  refused  to  consider 
it. 


178        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  No  use  to  try,"  he  said.  "  The  boys  won't  let 
you  go.  We've  had  you  out  in  the  rain  and  now 
we'll  try  to  make  amends  for  it.  Billie,  don't 
let  him  leave  the  place.  I'll  detail  you  as 
guard." 

"  You  hear  the  orders,"  she  said.  "  You're 
stuck  for  two  more  days  at  the  Three  Bar 
whether  you  like  it  or  not." 

"  That  settles  it,"  Deane  said.  "  I  do  want  to 
see  that  dance."  • 

Home  strolled  up  to  them  as  they  reached  the 
corral. 

"  Another  of  the  wild  bunch  down,"  he  said. 
"  Magill  this  time.  Got  it  just  the  same  as  Bar- 
ton did  last  week.  Shot  from  in  front ;  one  empty 
shell  in  his  gim.  The  Breaks  is  getting  to  be  a 
hard  place  to  reside  in." 

Again  the  girl  felt  that  queer  sensation  of  hav- 
ing expected  this  to  transpire,  as  if  possibly  she 
had  helped  plan  the  deed  herself  and  had  forgot- 
ten it.  That  night  as  she  lay  in  bed  her  mind  was 
concerned  with  it  and  at  times  the  solution  seemed 
almost  to  reach  the  surface  of  her  consciousness. 
Two  belated  riders  came  up  the  lane.  As  they 
rode  past  her  open  window  she  heard  the  name  of 
Magill. 

"  That's  two  for  Bangs,"  said  a  voice  she  knew 
for  Moore's. 

The  evasive  sense  of  familiarity,  of  being  in 
some  way  identified  with  the  kilhngs,  was  sud- 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        179 

denly  clear  to  her, — so  clear  that  she  marveled 
at  not  having  known  at  once. 

Old  Rile  Foster  was  haunting  the  Breaks  near 
Arnold's,  imposing  grim  and  merciless  justice  on 
all  those  whom  he  suspected  of  having  had  a  hand 
in  the  finish  of  Bangs. 


Hairris  had  left  the  ranch  an  hour  before  day- 
light, his  ride  occasioned  by  the  reports  of  several 
of  the  men.  In  the  last  three  days  each  couple 
that  worked  the  range  had  found  one  or  more  of 
the  new  white-face  bulls  shot  down  in  their  terri- 
tory. The  evidence,  as  Harris  pieced  the  scraps 
together,  indicated  that  a  lone  rider  had  made  a 
swift  raid,  riding  for  forty  miles  along  the  foot 
of  the  hills  in  a  single  day,  shooting  down  every 
Three  Bar  bull  that  crossed  his  trail.  A  dozen 
dead  animals  marked  his  course.  A  few  more 
such  raids  and  the  Three  Bar  calf  crop  would  be 
extremely  short  the  following  spring.  The  near 
end  of  the  foray  had  extended  to  within  ten  miles 
of  the  home  ranch  and  Harris  had  gone  out  to 
have  a  look  at  some  of  the  nearer  victims.  He 
located  two  by  the  flights  of  meat-eating  birds 
but  range  stock  had  blotted  out  all  possible  signs. 
He  rode  back  to  the  corrals  in  the  early  afternoon 
and  joined  Billie  and  Deane. 

"  Not  a  track,"  he  said.  "  We  must  expect 
more  or  less  of  that.  They'll  cut  in  on  us 
wherever  there's  a  chance." 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        181 

As  Harris  left  them  the  girl  pointed  out  a 
horseman  riding  up  the  lane. 

"  The  sheriff,"  she  volunteered,  and  Deane 
noted  an  odd  tightening  of  her  lips. 

Alden  dismounted  and  accosted  Moore  and 
Home.  From  their  grinning  faces  she  knew  that 
they  were  deliberately  evading  whatever  ques- 
tions the  sheriff  might  be  asking.  Home's  voice 
reached  them. 

"  Whoever  it  is  seems  to  be  doing  a  right  neat 
job,"  he  said.    "  Why  not  let  him  keep  it  up?  " 

The  sheriff  came  over  to  Deane  and  the  girl. 

"  Billie,  I  expect  you  can  tell  me  who's  doing 
this  killing  over  in  the  Breaks,"  he  said. 

She  was  unaccustomed  to  the  easy  dissimula- 
tion that  was  second  nature  to  the  men  of  the 
whole  countryside  and  her  eyes  fell  under  the 
sheriff's  steady  gaze.  Deane  was  looking  into  her 
face  and  with  a  shock  he  realized  that  she  could 
pronounce  the  name  of  the  assassin  but  was  de- 
liberately withholding  it.  She  raised  her  head 
with  a  trace  of  defiance. 

"  No.     I  can't  tell  you,"  she  said. 

Deane  expected  to  hear  the  sheriff's  curt  de- 
mand that  she  divulge  the  name  of  the  man  he 
sought.  It  must  be  easily  apparent  to  him,  as  it 
was  to  Deane,  that  she  knew.  But  Alden 
cnly  dropped  a  hand  on  her  shoulder  and  stood 
looking  down  at  her. 

"All  right,  girl,"  he  said  mildly.     "  I  reckon 


i82        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

you  can't  tell.  He  can't  be  such  a  rotten  sort  if 
you  refuse  to  turn  him  up."  He  pushed  back  his 
hat  and  smiled  at  Deane.  "  We  have  to  humor 
the  womenfolks  out  here,"  he  explained,  as  he 
turned  toward  the  bunk  house. 

Deane,  already  at  a  loss  to  grasp  the  mental  at- 
titude of  the  range  dwellers,  was  further  mysti- 
fied by  a  sheriff  who  spoke  of  humoring  the  ladies 
in  a  matter  pertaining  to  a  double  killing. 

"Billie,  you  know!"  he  accused;  "why 
wouldn't  you  tell? " 

"  Because  there's  a  good  chance  that  he's  a 
friend  of  mine,"  she  stated  simply.  "  Those  men 
had  it  coming  to  them  and  some  way  I  can't  feel 
any  regret." 

"  But  if  it  was  justified  he  should  give  himself 
up  and  stand  trial,"  he  said. 

"  Then  let  him  do  it  of  his  own  accord,"  she 
said.  "  I  certainly  won't."  The  memory  of  lit- 
tle Bangs,  his  adoring  gaze  fastened  on  her  face, 
was  uppermost  in  her  mind  and  brought  a  lump 
to  her  throat.     "  I  hope  he  gets  them  all." 

"  Billie,  let  me  take  you  away  from  all  this," 
Deane  urged  again.  "  Let  me  give  you  the 
things  every  girl  should  have — shut  all  the  rough 
spots  out  of  your  path.  I  want  to  give  you  the 
things  every  girl  needs  to  round  out  her  life — a 
home  and  love  and  shelter." 

Shelter!  Slade's  words  recurred  to  her:  "A 
soft  front  lawn  to  range  in." 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        183 

"  This  is  what  I  need,"  she  said  and  waved  an 
arm  in  a  comprehensive  sweep.  Two  hands,  re- 
cently arrived,  were  unpacking  before  the  bmik 
house.  A  third  was  shoeing  a  horse  near  the 
blacksmith  shop.  The  mule  teams  were  plowing 
in  the  flats.  A  line  of  chap-clad  men  roosted  as 
so  many  crows  on  the  top  bar  of  the  corral,  mildly 
interested  in  the  performance  of  another  who 
twirled  a  rope  in  a  series  of  amazing  tricks. 
*'  That's  what  I  need;  all  that,"  she  said.  "And 
5'ou're  asking  me  to  give  it  up." 

"  But  it's  not  the  life  for  a  girl,"  he  insisted. 

"  You've  told  me  a  hundred  times  that  I  was 
different  from  other  girls.  But  now  you're 
wanting  me  to  be  like  all  the  rest.  Where  would 
the  difference  be  then?  "  she  asked  a  little  wist- 
fully. "  Why  can't  you  go  on  liking  me  the  way 
I  am,  instead  of  making  me  over?  " 

But  Carlos  Deane  could  not  see.  It  was  his 
hist  evening  alone  with  her  and  after  the  meal 
tliey  rode  across  the  hills  through  the  moonlight. 
In  that  hour  she  was  very  near  to  doing  as  he 
wished.  If  only  he  had  suggested  that  she  come 
to  him  as  soon  as  the  Three  Bar  was  once  more  a 
prosperous  brand;  had  only  pointed  out  how  she 
could  spend  months  of  each  year  on  the  old  home 
ranch, — ^then  he  might  have  won  his  point  without 
waiting.  But  that  is  not  the  way  of  man  toward 
woman.  His  plea  was  that  she  leave  all  this  be- 
hind— for  him.     And  his  hold  was  not  quite 


i84        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

strong  enough  to  induce  her  to  give  up  every  link 
of  the  life  she  had  loved  for  long  years  before 
Carlos  Deane  had  been  even  a  part  of  it. 

"  I  can't  tell  you  now,"  she  said  as  they  rode 
back  to  the  corrals.  "  Not  now.  It  would  take 
something  out  of  me — the  vital  part — if  I  had  to 
leave  the  old  Three  Bar  in  the  shape  it's  in  to- 
day.   It's  sort  of  like  deserting  a  crippled  child." 

The  next  day  her  stand  was  unaltered  and  in 
the  evening,  when  the  whole  Three  Bar  personnel 
swung  to  their  saddles  and  headed  for  the  frolic  at 
Brill's,  Deane  had  been  unable  to  gain  her  prom- 
ise. His  luggage  had  been  sent  ahead  in  a  buck- 
board,  for  the  dance  was  to  be  an  all-night  affair 
and  he  would  leave  on  the  morning  stage. 

There  were  but  few  horses  at  the  hitch  rails 
when  they  reached  the  post  but  a  dozen  voices 
raised  in  song  drifted  faintly  to  their  ears  and 
apprised  them  of  the  fact  that  other  arrivals  were 
not  far  behind.  As  the  Three  Bar  girl  entered 
at  the  head  of  her  men  she  saw  Bentley  and  Car- 
penter leaning  against  the  bar,  well  toward  the 
rear  of  the  room.  Si 

Within  the  last  week  she  had  heard  that  Carp, 
after  being  let  off  by  Harris,  had  started  up  a 
brand  of  his  own  down  in  Slade's  range.  Har- 
ris's remarks  about  Slade's  mode  of  acquiring 
new  brands  recurred  to  her, — that  he  fostered 
some  small  outfit  for  a  few  seasons,  then  bought 
it  out.     As  the  men  scattered  she  commented 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        185 

on  this  to  Harris.  The  Three  Bar  foreman 
nodded. 

"  Likely  the  same  old  move,"  he  said.  "  I've 
been  trying  to  get  a  line  on  Carp.  He  started 
off  with  a  bill  of  sale  from  Slade  for  a  hundred 
head  of  Three  Bar  rebrands.  But  it  didn't  come 
direct  from  Slade  at  that.  Morrow  engineered 
ihe  deal.  Said  he  came  into  the  paper  for  two 
years'  back  pay  from  Slade ;  last  year  and  the  one 
before — had  figured  to  start  up  for  himself  and 
was  to  draw  his  pay  in  cows.  The  paper  is  dated 
at  the  time  Morrow  quit  Slade  last  year.  What 
can  we  prove  wrong  with  that?  Morrow  simply 
sells  the  paper  to  Carp.  Of  course  it's  a  plant. 
All  Carp  has  to  do  is  to  run  Slade's  Triangle  on 
the  hips  of  any  number  of  Three  Bar  she-stock. 
Ijike  I  told  you,  there's  no  way  to  check  Slade  up 
on  the  number  of  our  rebrands.  If  Carp  gets 
caught  it's  his  own  hard  luck." 

A  dozen  men  from  the  Halfmoon  D  swarmed 
in  the  door.  Mrs.  McVey,  the  owner's  wife,  sta- 
tioned herself  in  one  corner  with  the  Three  Bar 
girl  while  the  men  gravitated  to  the  bar. 

"  I'll  take  Deane  in  tow  for  a  while,"  Harris 
said.  "And  get  him  acquainted  with  folks."  He 
led  Deane  to  the  bar  and  gave  him  scraps  of  the 
history  of  various  neighbors  as  they  arrived. 

Harper's  men  came  in,  the  albino  standing  half 
a  head  taller  than  any  other  on  the  floor,  and  they 
mingled  with  the  rest  as  if  their  records  were  the 


i86        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

most  immaculate  of  the  lot.  Two  of  S lade's 
foremen  arrived  with  their  families.  The  wife  of 
one  was  lean  and  bent,  worn  from  years  of 
drudgery.  The  other  was  an  ample,  red-cheeked 
woman  of  great  self-confidence,  her  favorite  pose 
that  of  planting  both  hands  on  her  hips,  elbows 
outspread,  and  nodding  vigorously  to  emphasize 
her  speech. 

Bart  Epperson,  a  trapper  from  far  back  in  the 
hills,  had  brought  his  family  to  the  frolic.  Mrs. 
Epperson  was  a  tiny,  meek  woman  who  had  but 
little  to  say.  Her  two  daughters,  in  their  late 
teens,  had  glossy  black  hair,  high  cheek  bones  and 
faint  olive  tinge  of  skin  which  betrayed  a  trace  of 
Indian  ancestry. 

Lafe  Brandon  came  at  the  head  of  his  tribe. 
Ma  Brandon,  white-haired  and  motherly  and  re- 
spected by  all,  was  possessed  of  a  queer  past 
known  to  the  whole  community.  Forty  years 
before  Lafe  Brandon  had  stopped  at  a  sod  hut  on 
the  Republican  and  found  a  girl  wife  with  both 
eyes  discolored  from  blows  of  her  heavy-handed 
spouse.  Lafe  had  left  the  bearded  ruffian  un- 
conscious, with  a  broken  nose  and  three  fractured 
ribs,  and  had  ridden  off  with  the  girl.  Five  sons 
and  a  daughter  had  been  born  to  them.  Two 
years  before.  Kit  Brandon,  the  daughter,  had 
been  wed  to  a  merchant  in  Coldriver.  The  trav- 
eling parson  who  married  them  heard  of  the 
parents'  queer  case,  learned  that  Ma  Brandon's 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        187 

fonner  mate  was  long  since  dead,  and  spoke  ear- 
nestly to  the  pair.  Both  were  willing  to  do  any- 
thing which  might  prove  of  futm-e  benefit  to  Kit. 
The  conference  resulted  in  the  old  couple's  stand- 
ing before  the  parson  and  having  the  marriage 
service  performed  for  them  an  hour  before  a  like 
rite  was  rendered  for  the  daughter. 

Harris  laughed  as  he  informed  Deane  of  this 
bit  of  history. 

"  They  both  considered  it  rather  an  unneces- 
sary fuss,"  he  said.  "And  it's  rumored  that  they 
had  their  first  quarrel  of  a  lifetime  on  the  way 
home  from  the  service." 

Two  of  the  sons  were  married  and  living  at  the 
home  ranch.  They  came  to  the  dance  with  the 
rest  of  the  family.  Lou  Brandon's  wife,  Dolly, 
was  a  former  dance-hall  girl  of  Coldriver,  and  AI 
Brandon's  better  half,  Belle,  was  the  daughter  of 
a  Utah  cowman. 

An  extra  stage-load  rolled  in  from  Coldriver 
and  four  couples  joined  the  throng. 

"  Ex  -  school  -  teachers,"  Harris  informed. 
'*  They  marry  them  so  fast  that  it's  hard  to  keep 
one  on  the  job  instructing  the  rising  generation 
in  the  Coldriver  school." 

Deane  shrank  from  the  thought  of  the  Three 
Ear  girl  in  such  a  mixture.  Someway  she 
seemed  many  shades  finer  than  the  rest. 

"  It  couldn't  be  otherwise,"  Harris  said,  when 
Deane  expressed  this  thought.     "  She  was  raised 


i88        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

at  the  knee  of  one  of  the  finest  women  in  the 
world.  I  remember  her  mother  myself — a  little ; 
and  I've  heard  my  own  mother  sing  the  praises  of 
Elizabeth  Warren  a  thousand  times." 

The  albino  interrupted  them. 

"  Cal — how  come? "  he  greeted.  The  three 
men  conversed  in  the  most  casual,  friendly  fash- 
ion, as  if  there  had  never  been  a  hint  of  friction 
between  Harris  and  Harper  in  the  past. 

A  great  voice  rose  above  the  buzz  of  conversa- 
tion, filling  the  big  room  to  the  very  rafters. 

"  Choose  your  pardners  for  the  dance!  "  Wad- 
dles bellowed  from  the  makeshift  platform  at  one 
end  of  the  room.     "  Go  get  your  ga-a-als!  " 

Deane  moved  across  to  the  Three  Bar  girl. 
There  was  a  general  rush  for  the  side  opposite  the 
bar  where  the  ladies  had  gathered.  Couples 
squared  off  for  the  Virginia  reel,  the  shortage  of 
ladies  rectified  by  a  handkerchief  tied  on  the  arm 
of  many  a  chap-clad  youth  to  signify  that  he  was, 
for  the  moment,  a  girl.  Waddles  picked  his 
guitar;  two  fiddles  broke  into  "  Turkey  in  the 
Straw  "  and  the  dance  was  on  with  Waddles  call- 
ing the  turns. 

All  through  the  room  they  shuffled  and  bowed, 
whirled  partners,  locked  elbows  and  swung,  the 
shriek  of  fiddles  and  scrape  of  feet  punctuated  by 
the  caller's  boom. 

"  Grab  your  gals  for  the  grand  right  an'  left! " 
the  big  voice  wailed.    "  Swing,  rattle  and  roar!  " 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        189 

"Clutch  all  partners  for  a  once  and  a  half!" 
"Swing  your  gals  and  swing  'em  high!" 
"  Prance,  scuffle  and  scrape!  " 

Slade  came  in  alone  as  the  first  dance  was 
ended. 

A  croupier  and  lookout,  imported  from  Cold- 
river  for  the  event,  opened  Brill's  roulette  layout 
in  one  corner,  a  game  he  usually  operated  himself 
on  the  occasions  when  his  patrons  chose  to  try 
their  fortune  against  the  bank.  The  rattle  of 
chips,  the  whir  of  the  ivory  ball  and  the  profes- 
sional chant  of  lookout  and  croupier  sounded  be- 
tween dances. 

"  Single  ought  in  the  green,"  the  croupier 
droned. 

"  Single  ought  in  the  green,"  the  lookout 
echoed.  "  The  pea-green  shade  is  the  bank's  per 
cent.  The  house  wins  and  the  gamblers  lose. 
Place  your  bets  for  another  turn." 

"  She's  off,"  the  croupier  chanted.  "  Off  again 
on  the  giddy  whirl.  The  little  ivory  ball — she 
spins ! " 

"  Ten  in  the  black,"  the  croupier  called. 

"  Ten  in  the  black,"  the  lookout  seconded. 
"  The  black  pays  and  the  red  falls  off;  the  even 
beats  the  odd." 

The  full  enjoyment  of  a  novel  scene  was 
spoiled  for  Deane  by  the  sickening  realization 
that  the  Three  Bar  girl  was  part  of  it,  rubbing 
elbows  with  the  nondescript  throng.     He  looked 


igo        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

again  at  Harper,  the  rustler  chief ;  at  Slade,  with 
his  peculiar  turtle-like  face,  Slade  the  cattle  king 
— the  killer.  Billie  Warren  stood  between  the 
two  Epperson  girls  whose  faces  betrayed  the 
taint  of  Indian  blood,  an  arm  about  the  shoulders 
of  each  of  them.  The  sheriff  who  had  said  that 
men  must  humor  womenfolks  was  leaning  against 
the  bar.  Deane  turned  to  Harris  but  found  him 
looking  off  across  the  room.  He  turned  his  own 
eyes  that  way  and  glimpsed  a  dark  man  with  an 
overlong,  thin  face  and  a  set  bleak  stare.  Mor- 
row had  just  come  in. 

Five  minutes  later  Harris  stepped  out  the  back 
door  and  Deane  followed  him.  At  the  sound  of 
a  footfall  behind  him  Harris  whirled  on  his  heel 
and  when  he  confronted  Deane  the  dim  light 
from  the  door  glinted  on  something  in  his  hand. 

"  Sho,"  Harris  deprecated.  "  I'm  getting 
spooky.  I  thought  it  was  some  one  else."  He 
slipped  the  gun  back  in  its  holster.  "  There's  one 
or  two  that  would  like  right  well  to  run  across  me 
from  behind." 

"  I  followed  you  out  to  tell  you  it  was  decent  of 
you  to  insist  that  I  stay  over  a  few  days,"  Deane 
said.  "  It  was  a  white  thing  to  do,  considering 
that  we  both  want  the  same  thing." 

"  We  both  want  her  to  have  what's  best  for 
her,"  Harris  said.  "And  I  don't  know  as  she 
could  do  any  better  than  to  take  up  with  you." 

"  It  may   sound  rather  trite — coming   after 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        191 

that,"  Deane  said.  "  But  anyway,  I'll  have  to 
say  that  I  feel  the  same  way  about  you." 

"  Then,  if  we're  both  ri^ht  in  our  estimates, 
why  she  can't  go  very  far  wrong,  either  way  she 
turns,"  Harris  said.  "  So  I  reckon  we're  both 
content." 

Harris  moved  on  and  motioned  Deane  to  ac^ 
company  him. 

''  I  thought  I  glimpsed  a  man  I  knew  a  few 
minutes  back,"  Harris  said.  "  Td  like  right  well 
to  have  a  talk  with  him." 

They  wandered  completely  round  the  post 
and  looked  in  the  shadows  of  the  outbuildings  but 
could  find  no  trace  of  life. 

"  Likely  I  was  mistaken,"  Harris  said  at  last. 
"  I  saw  a  face  just  outside  the  door.  He  was 
more  or  less  on  my  mind — the  party  I  thought  it 
was.  Some  one  else  I  expect,  and  he's  gone  in- 
side." 

They  returned  to  the  hall.  Morrow  stood  with 
two  Halfmoon  D  men  at  the  end  of  the  bar. 
Harris  motioned  him  aside  and  Morrow  with- 
drew from  the  others. 

"  This  is  pretty  far  north  for  you.  Morrow," 
Harris  suggested. 

"  Is  there  any  one  restricting  my  range? " 
Morrow  demanded.  "  If  there  is  I'd  like  to 
laiow." 

"  Then  I'll  tell  you,"  Harris  answered.  *'  The 
road  is  open — as  long  as  you  keep  on  the  road. 


192        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

Ally  time  you  stray  a  foot  off  the  beaten  trail 
you're  on  the  Three  Bar  range.  I  don't  figure 
to  get  gunned  up  from  the  brush  more  than  once 
by  the  same  man.  Every  Three  Bar  boy  has 
orders  to  shoot  you  down  on  sight  any  time  you 
heave  in  view  anywhere  within  twenty  miles  of 
the  Three  Bar;  so  I  wouldn't  stray  off  the  main- 
traveled  road  any  time  you're  going  through." 

Lanky  Evans  had  detached  himself  from  a 
group  and  Morrow  looked  up  to  find  the  tall  man 
standing  at  his  shoulder. 

"  So  you  hunt  in  pairs,"  Morrow  remarked. 

"  And  later  in  packs,"  Lanky  returned. 
"Why  don't  you  ever  come  up  and  visit  us? 
Every  time  I'm  riding  north  I  keep  looking  back, 
expecting  to  see  you  come  cantering  up  from  the 
south.  Harris  been  commenting  about  the  little 
dead-line  we've  drawn  on  you?  " 

"  What's  the  object  of  all  this  conversation? " 
Morrow  flared.  "  If  you've  got  anything  to  say 
to  me  why  get  it  over  with." 

"  Nothing  special,"  Evans  said.  "  I  just 
thought  maybe  I  could  goad  you  into  being  im- 
prudent enough  to  come  up  our  way — which  I'm 
sure  hoping  to  observe  you  north  of  the  line  and 
somewhere  within  a  thousand  yards." 

Evans  turned  away  and  Morrow  rejoined  the 
two  men  he  had  left  at  the  bar.  Deane  looked 
about  him.  Apparently  no  one  had  noticed  the 
little  by-play. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        193 

"  Evans  didn't  exactly  mean  quite  all  of  that," 
Harris  explained.  "  Of  course  if  Morrow  does 
come  up  our  way  Lanky  would  prefer  to  see  him 
first — but  he  would  rather  he'd  keep  away.  He 
staged  that  little  talk  as  a  safeguard  for  me.  If 
Morrow  acquires  the  idea  that  several  folks  are 
anxious  to  see  him  up  there,  he's  apt  to  be  real 
cautious  how  he  prowls  round  the  Three  Bar 
neighborhood  looking  for  me." 

Deane  looked  again  at  Morrow  and  saw  that 
Moore  and  Home  had  drawn  him  aside  from  the 
rest.  The  two  Three  Bar  men  were  grinning 
and  Morrow's  face  was  set  and  scowling. 

"  The  boys  must  have  framed  it  up  among 
themselves,"  Harris  said.  "  That's  the  third 
pair  I've  seen  conversing  with  him.  It's  doubt- 
ful whether  Morrow  is  deriving  much  pleasure 
out  of  the  dance." 

Deane  crossed  over  to  Billie.  The  music 
started  but  she  shook  her  head  as  he  would  have 
led  her  to  the  floor. 

"  Sit  down.  I  want  to  talk  with  you.  Long 
time  no  see  'um  after  to-night,"  she  said. 
*'  It'll  be  daylight  soon  and  I've  a  long  tale  to 
tell." 

As  the  others  danced  she  gave  him  a  dozen 
messages  to  impart  to  various  friends. 

"  Tell  Judge  Colton  that  Three  Bar  stock  is 
rising,"  she  said.  "And  that  as  soon  as  things 
are  all  smoothed  out,  he  can  expect  me  for  a 


194       The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

boarder.  I'm  going  to  make  him  one  nice  long 
visit." 

Practically  all  of  her  time  away  from  the 
Three  Bar  had  been  spent  with  Judge  Colton's 
family  and  she  was  accepted  as  part  of  the  house- 
hold. It  was  there  she  had  met  Deane  and  those 
others  to  whom  her  messages  were  sent. 

Through  an  opening  in  the  dancing  throng 
Deane  suddenly  had  a  clear  view  of  the  open  rear 
door — one  brief  glimpse  before  the  crowd  closed 
once  more  and  shut  off  his  view.  He  had  an  idea 
that  he  had  seen  a  face,  hazy  and  indistinct,  a  few 
feet  outside  the  door.  He  wondered  if  it  could 
be  the  friend  for  whom  Harris  had  searched. 

''  Make  the  visit  soon,  Billie,"  he  urged.  "  It's 
been  a  long  month  since  we've  had  you  with  us. 
We  thought  maybe  you'd  deserted  us  back  there. 
How  soon  will  this  visit  start — and  how  long  will 
it  last?" 

"  It  will  start  as  soon  as  the  Three  Bar  doesn't 
need  me,"  she  said.     "And  last  a  long  time." 

Again  a  lane  opened  through  the  crowd,  af- 
fording a  view  of  the  door.  Deane  saw  the  face 
outside  in  the  night,  and  a  foot  or  more  below  it 
some  bright  object  glinted  in  the  dim  light  which 
filtered  through.  The  music  ceased  and  the  chant 
of  the  roulette  croupier  began,  mingling  with  the 
smooth  purr  of  the  ivory  ball.  There  came  a 
sudden  hush  from  the  vicinity  of  the  rear  door,  a 
hush  that  spread  rapidly  throughout  the  room,  so 


Ji 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        195 

swift  are  the  perceptions  of  a  frontier  gather- 
ing. 

Old  Rile  Foster  stood  just  inside,  his  gun  half- 
raised  before  him.  Canfield  and  Lang  stood  to- 
gether in  the  center  of  the  floor,  apart  from  the 
rest  and  with  no  others  in  line  beyond  them.  Rile 
tossed  a  boot  heel  on  to  the  floor  and  as  it  rolled 
toward  the  two  men  he  shot  Canfield  through  the 
c^hest.  Lang's  gun  crashed  almost  with  his  own. 
Rile's  knees  sagged  under  him  and  he  pitched 
lace  down  on  the  floor,  his  arms  sprawled  out  be- 
ibre  him. 

The  surge  of  the  crowd,  pressing  back  out  of 
line,  threw  the  albino  on  the  edge  of  it,  his  big 
form  towering  alone. 

The  old  man  raised  his  head  from  the  floor  and 
crooked  his  wrist  with  the  last  of  his  ebbing 
strength. 

"  Four  for  Bangs,"  he  said,  and  shot  Harper 
between  the  eyes. 


XI 

The  two  loggers  had  finished  cutting  their 
quota  of  timber  for  the  homestead  cabins  and  the 
white  peeled  logs  lay  piled  and  ready  to  be  snaked 
down  to  the  Three  Bar  on  the  first  heavy  snows 
of  fall.  The  choppers  had  transferred  their  op- 
erations to  the  lower  broken  slopes  which  they 
scoured  for  the  scattered  cedars  of  the  foothills, 
cutting  them  for  fence  posts  and  piling  them  in 
spots  accessible  to  the  wagons  to  be  hauled  when- 
ever the  mule  teams  could  be  spared. 

The  acreage  of  plowed  ground  increased  day 
by  day  and  would  continue  till  frost  claimed  the 
ground.  As  soon  as  the  brush  was  burnt  the 
mule  teams  pulled  heavy  log  drags  across  the 
field,  pulverizing  the  lumps  and  leveling  inequali- 
ties of  the  surface.  ^ 

Evans  had  been  sent  out  as  foreman  of  the  beef 
round-up  while  Harris  remained  behind  to  direct 
the  operations  at  the  ranch.  The  details  of  the 
new  work  were  unfamiliar  ones  for  the  girl  and 
she  was  entirely  absorbed  in  learning  the  reasons 
for  every  move;  so  much  engrossed,  in  fact,  that 
she  had  not  left  the  Three  Bar  during  the  month 
which  had  elapsed  since  the  dance  at  Brill's.     A 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        197 

few  days  before  Evans  was  due  with  the  beef 
herd  she  rode  Papoose  away  from  the  ranch,  in- 
tending to  make  a  long-deferred  visit  to  the 
Brandons. 

After  covering  two-thirds  of  the  distance  along 
the  foot  of  the  hills  to  the  V  L  she  saw  a  rider  dip 
over  a  ridge  two  miles  away.  She  unslung  Har- 
ris's glasses  and  dismounted  to  watch  for  his  re- 
appearance. When  he  came  again  into  her  field 
of  view  another  man  was  with  him  and  they  were 
driving  a  few  head  of  cows  before  them.  They 
angled  into  a  valley  that  led  off  to  the 
south,  dropping  into  it  some  three  miles  from 
her. 

She  mounted  Papoose  and  headed  him  on  a 
parallel  course,  keeping  well  out  of  sight  behind 
the  intervening  waves  of  ground.  After  holding 
her  direction  at  a  stiff  lope  till  satisfied  that  she 
liad  passed  the  men  she  angled  across  to  intersect 
their  course. 

As  Papoose  topped  a  low  hogback  that  flanked 
the  valley  she  saw  the  men  riding  toward  her 
clown  the  bottoms,  driving  twenty  or  more  head 
of  cows.  One  of  the  horses  threw  up  his  head, 
his  ears  pricked  sharply  toward  her,  and  the  swift 
upward  tilt  of  the  rider's  hat,  as  swiftly  lowered, 
informed  her  that  she  had  been  sighted.  The 
other  man  did  not  look  up.  They  lifted  their 
horses  from  a  walk  to  a  stiff  trot  and  veered  past 
the  cows,  then  looked  up  as  if  just  aware  of  her 


198        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

approach,  and  waited  for  her.  The  men  were 
Bentley  and  Carp. 

Bentley  greeted  her  cheerily.  Carp  nodded 
without  a  word. 

"  What  are  you  two  doing  up  here? "  she  de- 
manded without  parley. 

"  I  repped  with  the  Three  Bar  wagon  and 
Carp  worked  with  you  for  a  spell  so  we  sort  of 
know  the  range,"  Bentley  explained.  "  Slade 
sent  us  up  to  drift  any  strays  back  south." 

"  Those  you  were  driving  are  Three  Bar  stuff 
— every  hoof,"  she  said.  "All  two-year-old  she- 
stock." 

Bentley  turned  and  regarded  the  little  herd 
they  had  just  passed. 

"  Them?  Sho — we  wasn't  driving  them," 
Bentley  denied  easily.  "  They  just  drifted 
ahead  of  us  as  we  rode  down  the  bottoms.  A 
cow  critter  will  always  move  on  ahead  of  a  man. 
We  rode  on  past  'em  as  soon  as  we  decided  to 
amble  along." 

She  knew  that  they  were  on  safe  ground. 
Any  cow  would  drift  on  before  a  horseman. 

"  The  only  way  to  convict  a  man  on  a  case  like 
this  is  to  shoot  him  out  of  the  saddle  before  he 
has  a  chance  to  pass  the  cows,"  she  said.  "  That's 
what  will  happen  to  the  next  Slade  rider  that  gets 
noticed  with  any  Three  Bar  cows  moving  out  in 
front  of  him  and  headed  south.  You  can  carry 
that  word  to  Slade." 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        199 

She  whirled  Papoose  and  headed  back  for  the 
ranch,  the  intended  visit  to  the  Brandons  post- 
poned. Harris  was  piling  brush  in  the  lower 
field  when  she  arrived  and  she  informed  him  of 
the  act  of  the  two  men. 

"  I  wouldn't  put  it  past  Carp,"  he  said.  "  But 
1  hadn't  sized  Bentley  up  just  that  way.  It's 
hard  to  tell.  If  Carp  shows  up  here  again  we'll 
make  him  a  visit  in  the  middle  of  the  night — and 
he  won't  trouble  us  much  after  that." 

"  We'd  better  pay  Slade  a  night  visit  too,"  she 
said.  Her  feelings  toward  Slade  had  undergone 
a  complete  revulsion.  She  knew  beyond  a  doubt 
that  he  had  been  responsible  for  the  raid  on  Three 
Bar  bulls.  The  wild  bunch  would  have  had  no 
object  in  such  a  foray.  Figuring  it  from  any 
angle  Slade  was  the  only  one  man  who  could  pos- 
sibly derive  any  benefit  from  that.  She  had  come 
to  see  that  Slade  was  fighting  with  his  back  to  the 
A^  all, — that  he  had  run  his  course  and  come  to  the 
end  of  it  if  squatters  secured  a  start  in  his  range, 
and  he  considered  the  act  of  the  Three  Bar  the 
opening  wedge  which  would  throw  open  the  way 
for  the  nesters  to  crowd  him  out. 

The  evening  of  the  following  day  the  beef  herd 
trailed  into  the  lower  end  of  the  Three  Bar  valley 
and  bedded  for  the  night.  In  the  morning  the 
trail  herd  was  headed  for  the  railroad  under  a  full 
crew,  for  Harris  had  kept  all  hands  on  the  job. 

There  was  none  of  the  fast  and  varied  work  of 


2CX)        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

the  round-up ;  the  trail-herding  of  beef  to  market 
seeming  a  slow  and  monotonous  procedure  in 
comparison.  The  cows  were  drifted  slowly  south, 
well  siDread  out  and  grazing  as  they  moved. 
Harris  detailed  two  men  to  ride  the  "  points,"  the 
two  forward  extremities  of  the  herd;  two  others 
rode  the  "  drags,"  holding  to  either  flank  of 
the  rear  end  of  the  drive.  In  choppy  country 
he  detailed  a  third  pair  to  skirt  the  middle 
flanks  and  prevent  leakage  up  any  feathering 
coulees. 

The  chuck  wagon  followed  a  mile  behind  and 
the  horse  wrangler  brought  up  the  rear,  bringing 
the  remuda,  much  depleted  in  numbers  from  full 
round-up  strength,  for  it  now  carried  but  three 
extra  horses  for  each  man. 

Three  hours  out  from  the  Three  Bar  some  of 
the  cows  showed  a  disposition  to  rest  and  calmly 
bedded  down;  the  forward  drift  of  the  herd  was 
arrested.  After  a  prolonged  rest  they  rose  in 
scattering  groups  to  feed  and  once  more  they 
were  moved  slowly  to  the  south.  The  men  not 
on  active  duty  with  the  herd  rode  in  knots  and 
whiled  away  the  time  as  best  they  could.  It  was 
the  habit  to  cover  less  than  twenty  miles  a  day 
with  the  beef  herd  as  any  strenuous  exertion 
would  reduce  the  weight  of  the  grass-fattened 
steers. 

The  drove  was  a  nondescript  lot.  In  addition 
to  the  steers  and  older  cows  that  comprised  every 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        201 

trail  herd,  the  off -color  she-stock  had  been  care- 
fully culled  from  the  range. 

Harris  pointed  to  the  bunch. 

"  Look  that  assortment  over  well,  Billie,"  he 
advised.  "A  few  seasons  more,  with  fair  luck, 
and  you  won't  see  one  of  these  rainbow  droves 
Avith  every  color  from  brindle  to  strawberry  roan ; 
none  of  those  humpbacked  runts;  they'll  all  be 
gone.  That's  ahnost  the  last  mongrel  herd  that 
\7ill  ever  wear  your  brand.  They'll  run  better 
every  year  until  we  have  all  big  flat-backed  beef 
stock — a  straight  white-face  run." 

The  third  morning  out  from  the  home  ranch 
broke  stormy.  Gray,  leaden  skies  and  low  scud- 
ding, drab  clouds  drifted  over  the  foothills  and 
^  obscured  the  view  of  the  peaks.  A  nasty  drizzle 
dampened  the  face  of  the  world  and  laid  its 
clammy  touch  on  all  living  things.  This  condi- 
tion prevailed  all  through  the  day  and  shortly 
after  the  cows  had  been  milled  and  bedded  for  the 
night  the  drizzle  turned  to  rain,  now  falling 
straight  and  soft,  again  in  fierce  squalls  whipped 
by  varying  shifts  of  wind.  A  saddled  night  horse 
was  picketed  for  every  man.  The  wagon  stood 
close  under  a  hill  while  the  herd  was  bedded  on  a 
broad  flat  at  the  mouth  of  a  valley. 

The  men  lay  in  the  open,  their  bed-tarps  folded 
to  shed  as  much  moisture  as  possible.  The  soggy 
patter  of  the  rain  on  her  teepee  lulled  the  girl  to 
sleep  but  she  was  frequently  roused.     A  dull 


202        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

muttering  materialized  suddenly  into  a  sharp 
thunderstorm  and  the  canvas  walls  of  her  teepee 
were  almost  continuously  illuminated  by  succes- 
sive flashes.  The  picketed  horses  fretted  and 
stamped.  Between  peals  she  heard  the  voices  of. 
the  night  guards  singing  to  soothe  their  restless 
charges  on  the  bed  ground.  One  of  the  men 
shifted  his  bed  roll  from  a  gathering  puddle  to 
some  higher  point  of  gi'ound. 

She  dropped  to  sleep  again  but  was  roused  by 
voices  outside  as  the  guards  changed  shifts  and 
she  estimated  that  it  must  be  near  morning,  the 
fourth  change  of  guards. 

The  sounds  ceased  as  the  men  who  had  just 
been  relieved  turned  in  for  their  sleep.  A  horse 
neighed  shrilly  within  a  few  yards  of  her  teepee. 
Another  took  it  up  and  an  answer  sounded  from 
the  flats.  There  was  a  crash  of  pistol  shots,  a 
rumble  of  hoofs  and  the  instant  command  of 
Harris. 

"Rollout!  Roll  out!  "he  called.  "SaddlesI 
On  your  horses." 

Even  as  he  shouted  there  came  the  swish  of  wet 
canvas  as  the  men  tumbled  from  their  bed  rolls, 
the  imprecations  of  the  suddenly  awakened. 
Billie  thrust  her  head  from  the  teepee  flap,  the 
water  cascading  down  her  neck.  The  successive 
flashes  showed  the  men  tugging  desperately  at 
boots  and  chaps,  their  grotesque,  froglike  leaps 
for  their  tethered  mounts.     She   saw   Harris, 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        203 

buckling  his  belt  as  he  ran,  and  the  next  flash 
showed  him  vaulting  to  Calico's  back. 

The  thunder  of  hoofs  drew  her  eyes  to  the  bed 
ground  where  a  black  mass  surged,  then  bore  off 
up  the  valley.  A  scattered  line  of  riders  bore 
down  on  the  herd,  two  ghostly  apparitions  among 
them  throwing  the  cows  into  a  panic  of  fear.  She 
knew  these  for  riders  flapping  yellow  slickers  in 
the  wind.  As  the  light  faded  she  saw  three  hori- 
zontal red  streaks  cut  the  obscurity  and  knew  that 
one  of  her  guards  was  in  the  midst  of  the  rustlers, 
doing  his  single-handed  best.  The  red  splashes 
of  answering  shots  showed  on  all  sides  of  him. 
She  tugged  on  her  chaps  and  boots,  slipped 
Papoose's  picket  rope  and  vaulted  to  his  back. 

The  scene  was  once  more  illuminated  as  she 
rode  from  the  wagon.  A  big  pinto  horse  was 
strung  out  and  rimning  his  best,  the  other  Three 
Bar  men  pounding  after  him.  A  riderless  horse 
circled  in  the  flat,  a  dark  shape  sprawled  near 
him,  and  she  wondered  which  one  of  her  men  had 
gone  down.  A  knot  of  horsemen  were  turning 
up  an  opening  gulch  on  the  far  side  of  the  valley. 
A  half-dozen  Three  Bar  riders  veered  their  horses 
for  the  spot.  Han-is  turned  in  his  saddle  and  his 
voice  reached  her  above  the  tumult. 

"Let  'em  go!"  he  shouted.  "Let  'em  go! 
Hold  the  herd!" 

Far  off  on  the  opposite  side  she  made  out  a 
lone  horseman  riding  at  a  full  run  along  the  side- 


204        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

hill  above  the  cows  as  he  made  a  suiDreme  effort 
to  reach  the  head  of  the  run.  The  Three  Bar 
men  split  and  streamed  up  both  sides  of  the  bot- 
toms. The  flashes  had  ceased  except  for  brief, 
quivering  plays  of  less  than  a  second's  duration. 
She  hung  her  spurs  into  Papoose  and  trusted  to 
his  footwork.  The  swift  little  horse  passed  one 
rider,  then  another.  There  were  only  the  iiimble 
of  hoofs  and  the  crazed  bawling  of  cows  to  guide 
her  as  she  drew  near  the  rear  of  the  herd.  A 
half -flare  showed  the  pinto  a  bare  twenty  yards 
ahead,  with  Harris  putting  him  at  the  slope  to 
pass  the  cows.  She  swung  her  own  horse  after 
him  and  she  felt  the  frequent  skid  of  his  feet  on 
the  treacherous  sidehill.  Papoose  braced  on  his 
haunches  and  slid  down  a  precipitous  bank, 
buckled  up  the  far  side  and  down  again,  then 
swooped  across  a  long  flat  bench.  Three  times 
she  felt  the  heaving  plunge  and  jar  as  the  little 
horse  skimmed  over  cut-bank  coulees  and  washes 
which  her  own  eyes  could  not  see  in  the  dripping 
velvet  black. 

From  the  sounds  below  she  knew  they  were 
well  up  on  the  flanks  of  the  run  and  nearing  the 
peak.  The  stampede  seemed  slowing.  A  long, 
wavering  flash  revealed  Harris  a  dozen  jumps 
ahead.  Papoose  followed  the  paint-horse  as 
Harris  put  Calico  down  the  slippery  sidehill  and 
lifted  him  round  the  point  of  the  herd.  In  the 
same  flash  Billie  had  seen  two  slickers  out  before 


Jil 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        205 

the  peaks  of  the  run,  flapping  weirdly  in  the  faces 
of  the  foremost  cows.  This  accounted  for  the 
slowing-up  she  had  sensed.  Two  of  her  men 
were  before  them  and  she  wondered  how  this  had 
come  to  pass. 

The  hghtning-play  broke  forth  once  more. 
She  saw  two  riders  swinging  round  the  opposite 
point.  The  two  slickers  were  working  in  the 
center.  Harris's  gun  flashed  six  times.  She 
jerked  her  own  and  rolled  it.  The  two  riders 
who  had  just  rounded  the  far  point  joined  in. 
Cows  in  the  front  ranks  held  back  from  this  fear- 
some commotion  out  in  front.  Others,  driven  by 
the  pressure  behind,  forged  past  them,  only  to 
hold  back  in  their  turn  as  the  guns  flashed  before 
their  eyes. 

The  storm  ceased  as  suddenly  as  it  had  begun 
and  for  two  miles  she  rode  in  inky  darkness.  The 
last  mile  was  slower.  It  was  showing  gray  in  the 
east  and  the  night  run  had  spent  its  force.  The 
herd  stopped  and  the  cows  gazed  stupidly  about, 
standing  with  drooping  heads  and  heaving  sides. 
Three  Bar  men  showed  on  both  flanks  and  in  the 
rear.  They  had  held  the  drove  intact  and  pre- 
vented its  splitting  up  in  detachments  and  scat- 
tering through  the  night. 

Home  and  Moore  rode  over  to  them  and  for 
the  first  time  the  girl  noticed  that  the  two  men 
who  had  wielded  slickers  out  in  front  of  the  run 
were  nowhere  to  be  seen. 


2o6        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  Who  was  the  pair  out  ahead?  "  Moore  asked* 
"And  what  swallowed  'em  up?  " 

Harris  shook  his  head. 

"  Billie  and  I  were  the  first  to  make  the  front," 
he  said. 

"  Not  any,"  Moore  stated  positively.  "  I  saw 
'em  five  minutes  before  you  two  swung  round 
the  point.  I  was  wondering  who  had  outrode  the 
paint-horse  and  Billie's  little  nag." 

Moore's  left  side  was  plastered  with  mud,  as 
was  the  left  side  of  his  mount.  ^ 

"  I  was  on  guard  and  halfway  up  the  far  side," 
he  said.  "  Split  Ear  took  a  header  with  me  and 
delayed  me  some." 

He  pointed  to  the  mud  crusted  on  his  clothes. 
Billie  laiew  that  he  was  the  lone  rider  she  had 
seen  on  the  flanks  of  the  herd  as  she  rode  away 
from  the  wagon.  The  fall  accounted  for  their 
rounding  the  point  ahead  of  him.  Moore  was 
looking  off  across  the  country. 

"  Do  you  mean  to  tell  me  you  didn't  see  those 
two  slickers  flapping  out  in  front? "  he  de- 
manded. 

"  I  confess  I  didn't  observe  any,"  Harris 
said.  "You're  getting  spooky,  Moore.  A 
couple  of  white  cows,  likely,  out  ahead  of  the 
rest." 

Moore  regarded  him  curiously. 

"  Maybe  that's  so,"  he  said.  "  Waving  their 
tails  in  th^  air,  sort  of."     He  grinned  and  turned 


Ji 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        207 

his  horse  to  head  back  a  bunch  that  had  drifted 
out  of  the  herd. 

"  The  boys  made  a  nice  ride,"  Harris  said  to 
Home.  "  You  float  round  from  one  to  the  next 
and  tell  'em  we'll  soon  have  a  feed.  I'll  ride  back 
and  send  the  wagon  up." 

Billie  rode  with  him  as  he  skirted  the  herd  and 
started  on  the  return  trip.  Her  mind  was  occu- 
pied with  the  two  riders  who  had  slowed  the  run 
and  disappeared.  There  had  been  something  fa- 
miliar about  them,  for  every  man  has  his  indi- 
vidual way  of  sitting  a  saddle  as  he  has  an  indi- 
viduality of  gait  when  on  foot.  As  she  had 
viewed  them  in  the*  lightning's  flash  they  had 
closely  resembled  Bentley  and  Carp.  But  she 
decided  that  this  resemblance  had  been  but  a 
fancied  one,  suggested  by  the  fact  that  the  two 
men  had  been  much  on  her  mind  of  late. 

"  We're  not  hurt  bad,"  Harris  said.  "  The 
boys  held  them  bunched  in  good  shape.  Maybe 
forty  or  so  head  down  with  broken  legs — and  ten 
pounds  of  fat  apiece  run  off  the  rest." 

A  hatred  of  Slade  was  growing  within  her. 
Here,  too,  was  a  case  where  no  other  would  bene- 
fit by  the  senseless  stampede.  If  the  beef  herd 
could  be  broken  up  it  would  cause  a  delay  to 
round  it  up  in  a  strange  range  with  the  certainty 
of  many  cows  being  missed, — a  case  of  weaken- 
ing the  Three  Bar. 

She  had  been  so  absorbed  in  learning  the  de- 


2o8        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

tails  of  the  new  work,  so  elated  at  its  progress, 
that  she  had  come  to  believe  in  its  ultimate  suc- 
cess. And  they  had  been  unmolested  for  so  long 
a  time.  Then  had  come  the  wanton  slaughter  of 
Three  Bar  bulls  and  now  the  stampede  of  the 
trail  herd.  It  was  conclusive  proof  that  Slade 
had  abandoned  his  former  wearing-dowai  process 
as  too  slow  and  was  out  to  crush  the  Three  Bar  in 
the  speediest  possible  way  and  through  any  avail- 
able means. 

There  rose  in  her  a  flare  of  resentment  against 
her  neighbors,  the  Brandons  of  the  V  L  and  the 
McVeys  of  the  Halfmoon  D.  Both  had  taken 
out  papers  on  the  best  land  in  their  respective  lo- 
calities as  soon  as  forewarned  of  her  intended 
move.  Ostensibly  this  was  done  merely  as  a  pro- 
tection against  outsiders  but  in  reality  they  were 
hoping  that  she  would  win  out,  in  which  case  they 
would  go  through  with  their  filings  and  prove  up. 
But  neither  outfit  would  come  out  in  the  open 
and  give  her  their  support,  preferring  to  hold 
aloof  and  benefit  by  her  success  if  it  so  transpired 
and  lose  nothing  themselves  if  she  should  fail — 
part  of  the  policy  of  every  man  for  himself — in 
the  meantime  letting  her  brand  bear  the  brunt  of 
the  fight. 

Harris,  too,  was  pondering  over  Slade's  change 
of  tactics.  He  felt  assured  that  Slade's  own 
men  had  not  participated  in  starting  the  run. 
Slade  would  not  let  any  considerable  number  of 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        209 

his  boys  know  that  much  about  him.  Some  of 
Lang's  men  had  undoubtedly  been  hired  to  stam- 
pede the  Three  Bar  herd. 

"  The  very  fact  that  Slade  is  so  bald  with  it  is 
proof  that  he  sees  the  necessity  of  crowding  us 
fast,"  Harris  said.  *'  If  we  get  too  big  a  start 
he's  blown  up — and  he  hasn't  had  anything  to 
work  on  but  plowed  gTomid.  He's  out  now  to 
worry  us  at  odd  ends.  We  can  expect  a  steady 
run  of  mishaps  now,  for  he'll  work  fast — but 
we'll  win  out  in  the  end." 

She  nodded  a  little  wearily  for  she  Imew  that 
with  Slade  throwing  all  his  forces  against  her  the 
Three  Bar  would  be  hard  pressed.  In  addition 
to  this  worry  her  mind  was  concerned  with  the 
riderless  horse  she  had  seen  as  she  rode  away 
from  the  wagon,  the  huddled  figure  sprawled  in 
the  flat.  Every  Three  Bar  rider  was  a  friend  and 
she  hesitated  to  hear  which  one  of  her  men  had 
gone  down  in  the  raid. 

"  Who  was  it?  "  she  asked  at  last,  and  Harris 
divined  that  she  was  harking  back  to  the  fallen 
night  guard  who  had  tried  to  head  the  raiders 
alone. 

"  I've  been  trying  not  to  think  about  that,"  he 
said.  "  Lanky  was  a  good  pal  of  mine.  I  saw 
him  go  down,  but  I  couldn't  stop  right  then." 

Evans  occupied  a  place  in  her  regard  that  was 
perhaps  a  notch  higher  than  that  of  any  other  of 
the  crew.  / 


210        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  Can't  we  prove  anything  on  Slade — do  any- 
thing to  stop  him? "  she  demanded.  "  If  they've 
killed  Lanky,  I'll  perjure  myself  if  it's  the  only 
way.  I'll  have  Alden  pick  him  up  and  I'll  swear 
I  saw  him  do  the  thing  himself.  He's  as  guilty 
as  if  he  actually  had." 

"  I've  a  bait  or  two  out  for  Slade/'  Harris  said. 
"  But  that  way  may  prove  too  slow.  If  Lanky's 
gone  under,  I  expect  I'll  have  to  pick  a  quarrel 
with  Slade  and  hurry  things  along." 

"Don't  you!"  she  objected.  For  all  of  her 
confidence  in  Harris's  efficiency  in  most  respects, 
her  implicit  belief  in  his  courage,  she  could  not 
forget  the  awkward  swing  of  his  gun  and  she  had 
a  swift  vision  of  him  facing  Slade  without  a 
chance. 

A  crash  of  wagon  wheels  and  the  voice  of 
Waddles  admonishing  the  horses  interrupted  her. 
The  chuck  wagon  rolled  round  a  bend  as  the  big 
cook  followed  the  trail  of  the  night  run.  Every 
bed  had  been  rolled  and  loaded  to  eliminate  the 
necessity  of  a  return.  The  remuda  trailed  be- 
hind the  wagon  under  the  combined  supervision 
of  the  nighthawk  and  the  wrangler. 

"  How  is  Lanky?  "  was  Harris's  first  query. 

Waddles  jerked  a  thumb  over  his  shoulder. 
Evans,  shot  once  through  the  arm  and  a  second 
time  through  the  shoulder,  reclined  on  the  triple- 
thickness  bed  roll  the  cook  had  spread  for  him  on 
the  floor  of  the  wagon. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        211 

"  Only  nicked — clean  holes  and  no  bones," 
Lanky  said.  "  I'll  be  all  right  as  soon  as  Wad- 
dles will  let  me  out  of  this  chariot  and  I  get  to 
riding  comfortable  on  a  horse." 

"  He'll  come  round  fine  in  a  few  days  if  we  can 
keep  him  off  en  a  horse  and  riding  comfortable  in 
the  wagon,"  Waddles  countered.  "  I've  give 
him  orders  to  that  effect." 

Evans  groaned. 

"  He  drives  over  places  I  wouldn't  cross 
afoot,"  he  complained.  "Did  you  hold  the 
run?" 

Reassured  on  this  point  he  flattened  out  on  his 
pallet  and  the  wagon  held  on  toward  the  herd. 

The  weary  cows  were  held  over  for  a  day  of 
rest.  The  night  guards  were  doubled  and  this 
precaution  was  maintained  during  the  succeeding 
two  stops  before  reaching  the  shipping  point. 

Harris  and  Billie  sat  on  the  top  rail  of  the 
loading  chute  while  the  last  few  Three  Bar  steers 
were  being  prodded  on  board  the  cars. 

Harris  slipped  from  his  perch  and  motioned  to 
Moore  and  Home. 

"  You  can  go  up  toi^Ti  now  and  take  on  a  few 
drinks.  Hunt  up  an  old  friend  or  two  and  wag 
your  chins.  Make  it  right  secretive  and  confi- 
dential and  make  each  one  promise  faithful  not 
to  breathe  a  syllable  to  another  living  soul.  That 
way  the  news  is  sure  to  travel  rapid." 

He  returned  to  the  girl  as  the  stock  train 


212        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

pulled  out.  Two  hands  waved  a  joyous  farewell 
from  the  top  of  the  cars,  delighted  at  the  prospect 
of  a  trip  to  market  with  the  steers. 

"  I  don't  pretend  to  regret  that  old  Rile  played 
even  for  Bangs,"  Harris  said.  **  But  I  wish  he'd 
sorted  out  some  one  else  in  the  albino's  place.  It 
was  bad  business  for  the  Three  Bar  when  Harper 
went  down." 

"  He  was  the  head  of  the  gang,"  she  said. 
"  The  worst  of  the  lot." 

"And  for  that  reason  he  was  able  to  hold  them 
down,"  Harris  explained.  "  It  was  some  of  the 
outfit  from  over  in  the  Breaks  that  stampeded  us. 
Slade  wouldn't  let  his  own  boys  know  that  much 
about  him  so  he'd  hire  Lang.  Harper  had  brains. 
He  wouldn't  have  gone  in  for  that.  Lang  has 
thrown  in  against  us.  He's  all  bulk  and  no 
brains  and  as  savage  as  an  Apache  buck.  He'll 
hang  himself  in  the  end  but  in  the  intermi  he  may 
hand  us  considerable  grief." 


XII 

The  wild  riders  of  the  Breaks  no  longer  min- 
gled with  other  men  with  the  same  freedom  as  of 
old.  Some  fifteen  men  throughout  the  country 
felt  themselves  marked  and  set  apart  from  others. 
Friends  no  longer  fraternized  with  them  at-  the 
bars  when  they  rode  into  the  towns.  Doors 
M^hich  had  always  been  open  in  the  past  were  now 
opened  furtively  if  at  all.  Lukewarm  adherents 
fell  away  from  them  and  avoided  them  even  more 
studiously  than  the  rest.  This  swift  transition 
had  sprung  apparently  from  no  more  than  a 
whisper,  a  murderous  rumor  which  persisted  in 
the  face  of  flat  denials  issued  from  its  supposi- 
titious source. 

All  through  the  range  and  as  far  south  as  the 
railroad  it  was  current  gossip  that  the  Three  Bar 
would  pay  a  thousand  dollars  reward  for  each  of 
fifteen  men,  a  fast  saddle  horse  thrown  in  and  no 
questions  asked.  The  men  were  named,  and  if 
the  rumor  was  based  on  truth  it  was  virtually 
placing  a  bounty  on  the  scalps  of  certain  men  the 
same  as  the  State  paid  bounty  on  the  scalps  of 
wolves, — except  that  it  was  without  the  sanction 
of  the  law. 

This  backfire  rumor  had  established  a  definite 


214        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

line  with  fifteen  men  outside,  conspicuous  and 
alone,  and  those  who  had  once  followed  the  hazy 
middle  ground  of  semi-lawlessness  with  perfect 
security  now  hastened  to  become  solid  citizens 
whose  every  act  would  stand  the  light;  for  the 
whispers  seemed  all-embracing  and  it  was  inti- 
mated that  new  names  would  be  added  to  the 
original  list  to  include  those  who  fraternized  with 
the  ones  outside  the  pale. 

Those  not  branded  by  this  alleged  bounty  sys- 
tem were  quick  to  grasp  the  beautiful  simplicity 
of  it  all.  Some  recalled  that  a  similar  rumor, 
supposed  to  have  originated  with  old  Con  Ris- 
tine,  had  wiped  out  the  wild  bunch  that  preyed 
on  the  Nations  Cow-trail — that  the  Gallatin 
clean-up  had  resulted  from  a  like  report  which  Al 
Moody  was  reported  to  have  launched. 

It  had  the  effect  of  causing  the  men  so  branded 
to  view  all  others  with  suspicion,  as  possible  as- 
pirants out  to  collect  the  bounty  on  their  heads. 
It  sowed  distrust  among  their  own  ranks  for 
there  was  always  the  chance  that  one,  in  seeking 
safety  for  himself,  might  collect  the  blood-money 
posted  for  another.  The  reference  to  the  fast 
saddle  horse  was  guarantee  that  no  questions 
would  be  asked  before  the  price  was  paid  and  no 
questions  answered  after  the  recipient  had  ridden 
away  from  the  Three  Bar  with  his  spoils. 

Yet,  if  the  thing  were  true,  it  was  the  most 
flagrant  violation  of  the  law  ever  launched,  even 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        215 

in  the  Coldriver  Strip  where  transgression  was 
the  rule.  For  the  branded  men  were  not  wanted 
on  any  charge.  It  was  merely  the  wholesale 
posting  of  rewards  for  the  lives  of  some  fifteen 
(citizens  whose  standing  in  the  community  was 
]  egally  the  same  as  the  rest, — prize  money  offered 
l^y  an  individual  concern  for  its  enemies  without 
reference  to  the  law.  On  every  possible  occasion 
Harris  flatly  denied  that  there  was  a  shred  of 
truth  in  the  report.  Al  Moody,  years  before, 
had  also  denied  his  responsibility  for  the  rmnors 
on  the  Gallatin  range;  and  Con  Ristine  had  re- 
pudiated all  knowledge  of  the  whispers  that 
traveled  the  Nations  Trail.  But  in  each  case 
these  very  natural  denials  had  served  only  to 
strengthen  men's  belief  in  the  truth  of  the  re- 
ports ;  and  inevitably  they  had  established  a  hard 
line  that  cut  off  the  men  so  named  from  the  rest 
of  the  countryside. 

Harris  knew  that  his  own  life  was  forfeit  any 
time  he  chanced  to  ride  alone.  He  had  not  a 
doubt  but  that  Slade  had  put  a  price  on  his  head 
and  that  perhaps  a  dozen  men  were  patiently 
waiting  for  a  chance  at  him.  Any  man  whose 
name  appeared  on  the  black  list  which  he  was 
supposed  to  have  sponsored  would  overlook  no 
opportunity  to  retaliate  in  kind.  In  addition  to 
this  there  was  always  the  chance  of  a  swift  raid 
OQ  the  men  who  had  filed  their  homestead  rights 
ill  the  valley. 


2i6        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

As  a  consequence  Harris  had  taken  every  pos- 
sible precaution.  Winter  had  claimed  the  range 
and  hardened  the  ground  with  frost.  The  full 
force  of  Three  Bar  hands  had  been  kept  on  the 
pay  roll  instead  of  being  let  off  immediately  after 
the  beef  was  shipped.  These  riders  were  sta- 
tioned in  line  camps  out  on  the  range,  their  os- 
tensible purpose  being  to  hold  all  Three  Bar  cows 
close  to  the  home  ranch  but  in  reality  they  served 
two  ends,  acting  as  a  cordon  of  guards  as  well. 
The  two  woodcutters  were  camped  in  the  edge  of 
the  hills  behmd  the  ranch  and  daily  patrolled  the 
drifts  that  now  lay  deep  in  the  timber  for  signs  of 
skulkers  who  might  have  slipped  down  from  be- 
hind and  stationed  themselves  on  some  point 
overlooking  the  corrals. 

Three  times  in  as  many  weeks  strangers  drift- 
ing in  from  other  localities  stopped  in  Coldriver 
and  profanely  reported  the  fact  that  for  no  rea- 
son whatever,  while  passing  through  the  Three 
Bar  range,  they  had  been  held  up  and  forced  to 
state  their  business  in  that  neighborhood. 

Hostilities  had  ceased.  The  Three  Bar  girl 
had  anticipated  a  series  of  raids  against  the  cows 
wearing  her  brand,  swift  forays  in  isolated  points 
of  her  range,  but  no  stock  losses  were  reported. 
On  the  surface  it  appeared  that  Slade  had  given 
up  all  thought  of  harassing  the  Three  Bar.  But 
the  girl  had  come  to  know  Slade.  He  would 
never  recede  from  his  former  stand.     She  noted 


Ji 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        217 

that  Harris's  vigilance  was  never  for  an  instant 
relaxed  and  it  was  gradually  impressed  upon  her 
that  the  cessation  of  petty  annoyances  held  more 
of  menace  than  of  assurance.  Slade  had  seen 
that  the  Three  Bar  was  not  to  be  discouraged  in 
its  course  and  he  now  waited  for  an  opportunity 
tc  launch  a  blow  that  would  cripple,  striking 
simultaneously  at  every  exposed  point  and  delay- 
ing only  for  a  propitious  time.  In  the  face  of 
continued  immunity  she  was  filled  with  a  growing 
conviction  of  impending  trouble. 

Christmas  had  found  the  range  covered  with  a 
fresh  tracking  snow  which  precluded  possibility 
oi'  a  raid  and  all  hands  had  been  summoned  to  the 
home  ranch  for  a  two-day  rest.  Harris  knew 
that  cowhands,  no  matter  how  loyal  to  the  brand 
that  pays  them,  are  a  restless  lot  and  must  have 
their  periodical  flmg  to  break  the  monotony  of 
lonely  days;  so  he  had  provided  food  and  drink 
in  abundance.  The  frolic  was  over  and  the  hands 
back  on  the  range.  Harris  sat  with  Billie  before 
her  ftre. 

"  They'll  be  satisfied  for  another  two  months," 
he  said.  "  Then  we'll  have  to  call  them  in  for 
another  spree." 

This  evening  conference  before  the  fire  had 
come  to  be  a  nightly  occurrence.  Together  they 
went  over  the  details  of  the  work  accomplished 
during  the  day  and  mapped  out  those  for  the 
next.     From  outside  came  the  crunch  of  hoofs 


2i8        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

and  the  screech  of  logs  on  the  frozen  trail  as  the 
last  mule  team  came  down  with  its  load. 

Most  of  the  logs  had  been  skidded  down  and 
the  men  now  worked  in  pairs,  erecting  the  cabins 
on  each  filing.  The  cedar  posts  had  been  hauled 
and  strung  out  along  the  prospective  fence  lines. 
The  wagons,  under  heavy  guard,  had  made  two 
trips  to  the  railroad  to  freight  in  more  imple- 
ments and  supxDlies.  Thousands  of  pounds  of 
seed  oats  and  alfalfa  seed  were  stored  at  the 
Three  Bar  along  with  sixty  hundred  of  cement. 

"  Another  two  months  and  the  cabins  will  be 
roofed  and  finished,"  Harris  said.  "  Then  we'll 
be  through  till  the  frost  is  out  of  the  ground. 
We'll  start  building  fence  as  soon  as  you  can 
sink  a  post  hole ;  and  we'll  have  time  to  break  out 
another  two  hundred  acres  of  ground  before  time 
to  seed  it  down." 

The  girl  nodded  without  comment,  content  to 
leave  him  to  his  thoughts,  her  mind  pleasantly 
occupied  with  her  own.  For  long  her  evenings 
had  been  lonely  but  now  she  had  come  to  look 
forward  to  the  conferences  before  the  blazing 
logs.  She  had  made  no  attempt  to  analyze  the 
reasons  for  the  new  contentment  which  had  trans- 
formed her  evenings,  formerly  periods  of  drab 
reflections,  into  the  most  pleasant  portion  of  each 
day. 

Harris  gazed  about  the  familiar  room  and  won- 
dered what  the  future  held  out  to  him  if  he  should 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        219 

be  forced  to  spend  his  evenings  alone  after  hav- 
ing shared  them  for  six  months  with  the  Three 
Bar  girl.  The  weekly  letters  still  came  from 
Deane.  The  girl  valued  Harris  as  a  friend  and 
partner  without  aiDparent  trace  of  more  intimate 
regard.  He  wondered  which  would  prevail,  the 
ties  which  bound  her  to  the  life  she  had  always 
Imown  or  the  lure  of  the  new  life  which  beckoned. 

Suddenly,  without  having  sought  it,  the  expla- 
nation of  her  recent  contentment  bubbled  to  the 
surface  of  the  girl's  consciousness,  and  she  turned 
and  gazed  at  Harris.  Night  after  night  she  had 
sat  here  with  old  Cal  Warren  and  discussed  the 
details  of  their  work  and  after  his  passing  her 
evenings  had  been  hours  of  restlessness.  Now 
Harris,  the  partner,  had  crept  into  the  father's 
place, — had  in  a  measure  filled  the  void. 

Harris  rose  and  flicked  the  ash  from  his  ciga- 
rette, suppressing  the  desire  to  take  her  in  his 
arms,  for  he  knew  that  time  had  not  yet  come. 
As  he  opened  the  door  to  leave  an  eddy  of  steam 
curled  in  at  the  opening  as  the  warm  air  of  the 
room  battled  on  the  threshold  with  the  thirty-be- 
low  temperature  of  the  outside  world.  She  heard 
the  hissing  crunch  of  his  boots  on  the  frozen  crust 
— and  reached  for  Deane's  Christmas  letter  to  re- 
read it  for  perhaps  the  fifth  time. 

During  the  night  a  chinook  poured  its  warm 
breath  over  the  hills  and  morning  found  the  snow 
crumpling  before  it.    The  surface  was  a  pulpy 


220        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

mass  intersected  by  rivulets.  Water  trickled 
from  the  eaves  of  the  buildings  and  there  was  a 
breath  of  spring  in  the  air;  false  assurance  for 
those  who  knew,  for  it  was  inevitable  that,  once 
the  chinook  had  passed,  bitter  frost  would  clamp 
do^vn  once  more. 

Such  days,  however,  insj)ire  plans  for  spring 
and  Billie  rode  with  Harris  through  the  lower 
field  as  he  j)ointed  out  the  various  fence  lines  and 
the  lay  of  the  ditches  and  laterals  which  would 
carry  water  to  irrigate  the  meadow,  all  these  to  be 
installed  as  soon  as  winter  should  lose  its  grip. 

As  Harris  outlined  his  plans  his  words  were 
tinged  with  optimism  and  he  allowed  no  hint  of 
possible  disaster  to  creep  into  his  speech.  But  the 
girl  was  conscious  of  that  hovering  uncertainty, 
the  feeling  that  the  months  of  peace  were  but  to 
lure  her  into  a  false  sense  of  security  and  that 
Slade  would  pounce  on  the  Three  Bar  from  all 
angles  at  once  whenever  the  time  was  right. 

She  found  some  consolation  in  the  fact  that 
Lang's  men  no  longer  rode  through  her  range  at 
will,  but  skirted  it  in  their  trips  to  and  from  the 
Breaks.  She  attributed  this  solely  to  Harris's 
precautions  in  the  matter  of  outguards,  for  of  all 
those  within  a  hundred  miles  she  was  perhaps  the 
single  one  who  had  not  heard  of  the  sinister  rumor 
that  was  cutting  Lang  and  his  men  off  from  the 
rest  of  the  world. 

Men  were  discussing  it  wherever  they  met;  in 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        221 

Coldriver  they  were  speculating  on  the  possible 
results,  the  same  in  the  railroad  towns ;  across  the 
Idaho  line  and  south  into  Utah  it  was  the  topic 
of  the  day.  And  the  single  patron  of  Brill's  store 
found  the  same  question  uppermost  in  his  mind. 

Carson  was  one  of  the  many  who  were  neither 
wholly  good  nor  hopelessly  bad,  one  who  had 
drifted  with  the  easy  current  of  the  middle 
course.  And  he  was  wondering  if  that  middle 
course  would  continue  to  prove  safe.  He  played 
solitaire  to  pass  the  time.  His  horse  and  saddle 
had  been  lost  in  a  stud-poker  game  just  prior  to 
his  catching  the  stage  to  Brill's,  where  his  credit 
had  always  been  good.  He  rose,  stretched  and 
accosted  Brill. 

"  Put  me  down  for  a  quart,"  he  said. 

"  Whenever  you  put  down  the  cash,"  Brill  re- 
turned. 

"  What's  the  matter  with  my  credit? "  Carson 
demanded.    "  I've  always  paid." 

Brill  reached  for  a  book,  opened  it  and  slid  it 
on  to  the  bar.  He  flipped  the  pages  and  indi- 
cated a  number  of  accounts  ruled  off  with  red 
ink. 

"  So  did  Harper,"  he  said.  "  He  always  paid; 
and  Canfield — and  Magill;  these  others  too. 
Their  credit  was  good  but  they've  all  gone  some- 
wheres  I  can't  follow  to  collect.  And  they  was 
o^ving  me."  He  tapped  a  double  account. 
"  Bangs  was  into  me  a  little.    Old  Rile  paid  up 


222        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

for  him  and  then  got  it  in  his  turn — with  his 
name  down  for  a  hundred  on  my  books.  Harris 
and  Billie  Warren  paid  up  for  Rile.  Now  just 
whoever  do  you  surmise  will  pay  up  for  you?  " 

"Me?"  Carson  inquired.  "Why,  I  ain't 
dead.    I'm  clear  alive." 

"  So  was  they  when  I  charged  those  accounts," 
Brill  said.  "  But  it  looks  like  stormy  days  ahead. 
I  sell  for  cash." 

"  I'm  not  on  this  death  list,  if  that's  what 
you're  referring  to,"  Carson  announced. 

"  But  it's  easy  to  get  enrolled,"  Brill  said. 
"  Your  name's  liable  to  show  up  on  it  any  time. 
Seen  Lang  in  the  last  few  days? " 

"  Not  in  the  last  few  months,"  Carson  stated. 
"  Nor  yet  in  the  next  few  years.  He's  no  friend 
of  mine." 

"  I  sort  of  remember  you  used  to  be  right  com- 
radely," Brill  remarked. 

"  That's  before  I  really  knowed  Lang  inti- 
mate," Carson  said.  "  He  didn't  strike  me  as 
such  a  bad  sort  at  first;  but  now  he's  going  too 
strong.    Folks  are  getting  plum  down  on  him." 

"  What  you  mean  is  that  folks  who  used  to  be 
friendly  are  growing  spooky  about  getting  their 
own  names  on  that  list,"  Brill  said.  "  That's 
what  has  opened  their  eyes." 

"  Maybe  so,"  the  thirsty  man  confessed.  "  But 
anyway,  I'm  through." 

"  They're  all  through!  "•  Brill  said.    "  A  hun- 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        223 

dred  others  just  like  you,  scattered  here  and 
there.  It's  come  to  them  recent  just  what  a  bad 
lot  Lang  is.    It's  hell  what  a  whisper  can  do." 

"  It  is  when  that  whisper  is  backed  by  a  thou- 
sand-dollar reward,"  Carson  agreed.  "  If  he 
really  pays  up  it'll  wreck  Lang's  little  snap  for 
sure." 

Brill  dabbed  his  cloth  at  an  imaginary  sj)ot  on 
the  polished  slab  and  nodded  without  comment. 

"  I  reckon  he  launched  that  scheme  because 
Slade  put  a  price  on  him  first,"  Carson  said. 

"  I  didn't  know  Slade  was  into  this,"  Brill 
stated  softly.  "  There's  no  proof  of  that.  Not 
a  shred." 

"  No  more  than  there's  any  proof  that  Harris 
is  behind  these  rewards,"  Carson  said.  "  But  you 
loiow  that  Slade  is  out  to  wreck  the  Three  Bar 
since  they've  planted  squatters  there." 

The  storekeeper  failed  to  respond. 

"  There's  likely  a  dozen  men  looking  for  Har- 
ris right  now,"  Carson  prophesied. 

"  But  it's  hard  for  one  of  'em  to  get  within  ten 
miles  of  the  ranch,"  Brill  observed.  "  So  while 
they're  maybe  looking  for  him  it's  right  difficuljt 
to  see  him  that  far  off." 

"  I  don't  mind  admitting  that  I'm  for  Harris 
— as  against  Slade,"  Carson  said. 

"  Just  between  us  tAvo  I  don't  mind  confessing 
that  I'm  neutral — as  against  everythmg  else," 
Brill  returned. 


224        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  Now  you  loiow  how  I'm  lined  up.  Do  I  get 
that  quart?  "  Carson  urged. 

"  I  knew  how  you  was  lined  up  months  back." 
Brill  turned  on  a  dry  smile. 

"  I  ain't  told  a  soul  till  right  now,"  Carson  ob- 
jected.   "  So  how  could  you  know?  " 

"  You  didn't  need  to  tell.  As  soon  as  that 
rumor  leaked  out  it  was  a  cinch  where  you'd 
stand.  And  a  hundred  others  are  crowding  on  to 
the  same  foothold  along  with  j^ou." 

"  And  why  not?  "  Carson  demanded.  "  Who 
wants  to  get  a  thousand  plastered  on  his  scalp? 
It  would  tempt  a  man's  best  friends." 

"  Or  scare  'em  off,"  the  storekeeper  com- 
mented.   "  Which  is  all  the  same  in  the  end." 

A  half  dozen  men  clattered  up  in  front  and 
surged  through  the  door.  More  arrivals  followed 
as  the  regular  afternoon  crowd  gathered  before 
the  bar.  There  were  many  jobless  hands  drifting 
from  one  ranch  to  the  next,  "  grublining "  on 
each  brand  for  a  week  or  more  at  a  time  during 
the  slack  winter  months. 

Carpenter  rode  up  alone.  Brill  lowered  one 
lid  and  jerked  his  head  toward  Carson.  wm 

"  Broke — and  reformed,"  he  said.    "  Maybe." 

Some  minutes  later  Carp  bought  the  thirsty 
man  a  drink. 

"  You  looking  for  a  job?  "  he  asked.  "  I  can 
use  you  down  my  way."  ^'j 

Carson  was  well  versed  in  the  bends  of  the  de- 


Ji 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        225 

vious  trail  and  Carp's  ways  smacked  of  irregu- 
larities. Carson  had  ideas  of  his  own  why  the 
other  man  was  allowed  to  start  up  an  outfit  down 
in  Slade's  range.  One  day  Carp's  name  would 
be  cited  on  the  black  list.  As  diplomatically  as 
possible  he  refused  the  offer  of  a  job. 

The  storekeeper  smiled  as  he  noted  this.  Car- 
son had  turned  into  a  solid  citizen  almost  over- 
night. As  Carp  left  him  and  joined  another 
group  Brill  poured  Carson  a  drink. 

"  You're  a  fair  risk  at  that — as  long  as  you 
stay  cautious,"  he  remarked.  "  I'll  stake  you  to 
a  horse  and  saddle.  You  can  ride  the  grubline 
with  the  rest  of  the  boys  till  spring  and  get  a  job 
when  work  opens  up."  He  slid  a  bottle  across 
the  bar.    "  Here's  j^our  quart." 

He  stood  looking  after  him  as  Carson  moved  to 
a  table  and  motioned  several  others  to  join  him 
over  the  bottle. 

"  That's  about  the  tenth  reformation  that's 
transpired  under  my  eyes  in  as  many  days,"  Brill 
mused.  "  Give  us  time  and  this  community  will 
turn  pure  and  spotless.  I  don't  mind  any  man's 
owing  me  if  he  stands  a  fair  show  to  go  on  liv- 
ing." 

The  sheriff  dropped  in  for  one  of  his  infrequent 
visits  to  Brill's.    He  waved  all  hands  to  a  drink. 

"  I've  just  been  out  to  the  Three  Bar  to  see 
Harris,"  he  announced.  "  And  asked  him  about 
this  news  that's  been  floating'about.     He  came 


226        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

right  out  flat  and  says  he's  not  offering  a  rewards 
That's  all  a  mistake:" 

Every  man  in  the  room  grinned  at  this  state- 
ment. There  was  no  other  possible  reply  that 
Harris  could  make. 

"  Of  course,"  the  sheriff  said  reflectively.  "  Of 
course  there's  just  a  chance  that  Cal  lied  to  me." 

"  He  lied  all  right,"  Carp  prophesied.  "I'd 
bet  my  shirt  he'll  stand  to  pay  the  price  for  every 
man  that's  cited  on  that  list." 

"Shaw,"  the  sheriff  deprecated.  "That's 
dead  against  the  law,  that  is.    He  can't  do  that." 

"  He  will  do  it,"  Carp  predicted.  "  If  I  was 
on  that  list  I'd  be  moving  for  somewheres  a  long 
ways  remote  from  here." 

"  Then  you'd  better  be  starting,"  Alden  coun- 
seled mildly.  "  For  Harris  was  just  telling  me 
that  your  name  had  got  mixed  up  with  it.  Mor- 
row's name  has  sprung  up  too.  Cal  seemed  mys- 
tified as  to  how  it  had  come  about  for  he  says  you 
and  Morrow  never  rode  with  the  others  on  the 
list.  He  couldn't  figure  how  this  thing  come  to 
start." 

"Figure!"  Carp  snapped.  "He  figured  it 
out  himself,  who  else?  Are  you  going  to  stand 
for  his  putting  a  price  on  every  man  he  happens 
to  dislike?" 

"  But  he  says  he  don't  know  anything  about 
it,"  the  sheriff  expostulated.  "  So  how  can  I 
prove  he  does?    I'd  like  to  know  for  sure.    If  I 


Ji 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        227 

thought  he  was  actually  set  to  pay  those  rewards 
I'd  have  to  ride  over  and  remonstrate  with  Cal. 
That  would  be  in  defiance  of  the  law." 

One  or  two  who  had  been  drinking  with  Carp 
moved  over  to  speak  with  others  and  failed  to  re- 
turn. He  was  left  standing  alone  at  the  bar.  He 
shrugged  his  shoulders  and  went  out. 

"  Folks  are  considerable  like  sheep,"  Brill 
obsei-ved.  It  occurred  to  him  that  in  every 
saloon  and  in  every  bunk  house  within  a  hun- 
dred miles  the  topic  of  conversation  was  the 
same. 

He  lowered  one  lid  as  he  looked  at  the  sheriff 
and  jerked  his  head  toward  Carson. 

"  He's  broke — and  reformed,"  he  said.  "  Ab- 
solutely." 

The  sheriff  drew  Carson  aside. 

"  If  you're  wanting  a  job  I'll  stake  you  to  an 
outfit  and  feed  you  through  till  spring.  Forty  a 
month  from  then  on.  I'll  need  a  parcel  of  depu- 
ties, likely,  after  that." 

"  You've  got  one,"  Carson  stated.  "  I'll  sign 
now." 

The  storekeeper,  the  sheriff  and  the  new  dep- 
uty stood  at  one  end  of  the  bar. 

"  It's  queer  that  folks  don't  see  the  real  ob- 
ject of  this  rumor,"  Brill  observed. 

"  Its  object  is  to  clean  out  the  hardest  citizens 
in  the  country,"  Carson  said.  "  That's  why 
they're  named.    Why  else? " 


228        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  The  object  is  to  clean  up  the  rest  of  the 
country  first,"  Brill  said. 

Carson  grunted  his  disbelief. 

"  If  Harris  only  wanted  to  wipe  out  those  on 
the  list  he  wouldn't  go  to  all  this  fuss,"  Brill  ex- 
plained. "  He'd  just  put  on  an  extra  bunch  of 
hands  and  raid  the  Breaks  himself.  Swear  he 
caught  them  running  off  a  bunch  of  Three 
Bar  cows.  Simpler  and  considerable  less  ex- 
pense." 

"  Then  what's  the  object  of  this  bounty?  "  Car- 
son insisted. 

"  That's  aimed  at  the  doubtful  folks,"  Brill 
stated.  "  Folks  that  was  on  the  fence — ^like  you. 
This  death  list  makes  them  spooky  and  they  turn 
into  good  little  citizens  in  one  round  of  the  clock. 
It  leaves  the  worst  ones  outside  without  a  friend. 
Every  one  lined  up  solid  behind  the  law.  Public 
sentiment  will  start  running  strong  against  those 
outside.  Then  it'll  be  easy  for  the  sheriff  and  a 
bunch  of  deputies — like  you — to  clean  the  coun- 
try up  from  end  to  end,  with  the  whole  commu- 
nity backing  your  play." 

Carson  considered  this  for  some  time. 

"  Well,  I  can  furnish  the  deputies,"  he  said  at 
last.  "  Boys  that  are  strong  for  law  and  order 
from  first  to  last." 

"  I've  got  about  all  I  need,"  the  sheriff  said. 
"  A  dozen  or  so.  Mostly  old  friends  of  yours. 
I've  picked  'em  up  on  and  off  in  the  last  two 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        229 

weeks.  They're  strong  for  upholding  the  last 
letter  of  the  law — ^just  like  you  said." 

"A  dozen?  "  Carson  asked.  "  How'U  you  raise 
the  money  to  pay  that  many  at  once?  " 

"  I'm  sort  of  expecting  maybe  the  Three  Bar 
will  make  up  the  deficit,"  Alden  said.  "  It's 
cheaper  than  paying  rewards.  That's  another 
reason  I  don't  think  Cal  had  a  hand  in  this  black- 
list report." 

The  storekeeper  grinned. 

"  Surely  not.  Surely  not.  I'd  never  suspect 
him  of  that,"  he  said.  "  But  all  the  same  it's 
working  just  as  well  as  if  he  really  had." 


XIII 

The  first  warm  days  of  spring  had  drawn  the 
frost  from  the  ground.  Billie  rode  beside  Harris 
down  the  lane  to  the  lower  field.  A  tiny  cabin 
stood  completed  on  every  filing.  Two  men  were 
digging  post  holes  across  the  valley  below  the 
edge  of  the  last  fall's  plowing  and  the  mule  teams 
were  steadily  breaking  out  another  strip. 

"Almost  a  year,"  she  said,  referring  to  the 
commencement  of  the  new  work. 

"  Just  a  year  to-day,"  Harris  corrected,  and 
he  was  thinking  of  the  day  he  had  first  met  the 
Three  Bar  girl.  "  This  is  our  anniversary,  sort 
of." 

She  nodded  as  she  caught  his  meaning. 

"  The  anniversary  of  our  partnership,"  she 
said.  "  You're  good  on  dates.  We've  pulled  to- 
gether pretty  well,  considering  our  start." 

"  It  was  a  rocky  trail  for  the  first  few  days," 
he  confessed.  "  But  all  the  time  I  was  hoping  it 
would  get  smoothed  out." 

"  You  told  me  there  were  millions  of  miles  of 
sage  just  outside,"  she  recollected.  "  And  mil- 
lions of  cows — and  girls." 

"  Later  I  told  you  something  else,"  he  said. 


'*  And  I've  been  meaning  it  ever  since.    The  road 


J 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        231 

to  the  outside  is  closed.  If  I  was  to  start  now  I'd 
lose  the  way." 

She  pointed  down  the  valley  as  a  drove  of 
horses  moved  toward  them  mider  the  guidance 
of  a  dozen  men.  The  hands  would  start  break- 
ing out  the  remuda  the  following  day.  The 
spring  work  was  on. 

"  Off  to  a  running  start  on  another  year,"  he 
said.  "  And  sure  to  hold  our  lead."  They  drew 
aside  as  the  remuda  thundered  past  and  on 
toward  the  corrals.  "  From  to-day  on  out,  you 
and  I'll  be  a  busy  pair,"  he  prophesied. 

His  prediction  proved  true.  The  Three  Bar 
v/as  a  beehive  of  activity  and  it  seemed  that  the 
hours  between  dawn  and  dark  were  all  too  short 
for  the  amount  of  work  Harris  wished  to  crowd 
into  them. 

The  cowhands  were  breaking  out  the  horses  in 
the  corrals  while  the  acreage  of  plowed  land  in 
the  lower  fields  steadily  increased. 

The  heaviest  cedar  posts  were  tamped  in  place 
for  the  outer  fence  and  a  six-wire  barrier  held 
range  cows  back  from  the  bottoms  which  would 
soon  be  in  growing  crops.  It  crossed  the  flats  be- 
low the  lower  filings  and  followed  the  road  that 
held  to  one  side  of  the  valley  clear  to  the  Three 
Bar  lane.  On  the  far  side  it  mounted  the  bench 
that  flanked  the  bottoms  and  followed  the  crest 
of  it,  tying  into  the  home  corrals.  Lighter  three- 
wire  fences  marked  the  homestead  lines  within. 


232        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

The  daj^  that  Evans  led  the  men  out  on  the 
calf  round-ux3,  the  mule  teams  made  then-  first 
trip  across  the  plowed  land  with  the  drill. 

Harris  and  the  girl  sat  their  horses  and 
watched  the  initial  trip.  The  fields  were  being 
seeded  to  alfalfa  and  oats  so  that  the  faster  grow- 
ing grain  might  shade  and  protect  the  tender 
shoots  of  hay.  Before  the  grain  ripened  it  would 
be  cut  green  for  hay,  cured  and  stacked. 

When  the  seeding  was  comj)leted  Billie  worked 
with  Harris  and  together  they  ran  a  level  over 
the  seeded  ground,  marking  out  the  laterals  on 
grade  across  the  fields  from  points  where  they 
would  tap  the  main  feed  ditches  and  carry  water 
to  the  crops. 

Russ  and  Tiny  followed  the  lines  of  stakes 
which  marked  their  readings  of  the  level,  throw- 
ing a  plow  furrow  each  way.  A  second  pair  of 
homesteaders  followed  behind  them,  their  mules 
dragging  a  pointed  steel-shod  ditcher  which 
forced  out  the  loosened  earth. 

A  concrete  head  gate  was  installed  at  a  feasible 
take-out  point  on  the  Crazy  Loop.  Then  all 
hands  worked  on  a  main  feed  ditch  which  would 
carry  sufficient  volume  of  water  to  cover  every 
filing.  Lead  ditches  tapped  the  main  artery  at 
frequent  intervals,  each  one  of  capacity  to  carry 
a  head  of  water  to  irrigate  one  forty.  These  in 
turn  feathered  out  into  the  tiny  laterals  across  the 
meadow. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        233 

Early  rains  had  moistened  the  fields  and  they 
were  faintly  green  with  tiny  shoots  of  oats. 
These  thickened  into  a  rank  velvety  carpet  while 
the  homesteaders  were  hauling  a  hundred  loads  of 
rocks  to  form  a  crude  dam  across  the  stream  be- 
low the  take-out.  The  water  was  gradually 
raised  till  it  ran  almost  flush  with  the  top  of  the 
head  gate.  The  gates  were  lifted  and  the  di- 
verted waters  sped  smoothly  down  the  new  chan- 
nel to  carry  life  to  a  portion  of  the  sagebrush 
desert. 

A  few  days  would  find  the  cowhands  back  from 
the  round-up.  The  homesteaders  must  make  one 
more  trip  to  the  railroad  to  freight  in  the  stacker 
and  the  two  buck-sweeps  to  be  used  in  putting 
up  the  hay.  This  trip  was  delayed  only  till  the 
round-up  crew  was  back  from  the  range  for  a 
week  of  leisure  and  could  act  as  guards  while  the 
others  were  away. 

As  the  tangible  results  of  the  work  became 
more  apparent  Harris's  vigilance  increased. 
There  was  now  more  than  plowed  ground  to  work 
on;  crops  to  be  trampled  at  a  time  when  they 
would  not  lift  again  to  permit  of  mowing;  fences 
to  be  wrecked  so  that  range  stock  might  have  free 
access  to  the  fields.  A  single  night  could  upset 
tbe  work  of  many  months.  But  as  he  stood  with 
Billie  at  the  mouth  of  the  lane  he  allowed  none  of 
hi^  thoughts  to  be  reflected  in  his  speech. 

It  was  two  hours  before  dark  and  the  perspec- 


234        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

tive  toward  the  east  was  already  foreshortened. 
Two  jaekrabbits  hopx^ed  into  the  lane  and  moved 
down  toward  the  meadow.  The  homesteaders 
had  turned  their  hands  to  another  job.  Tiny  and 
Russ,  shod  with  rubber  boots,  were  leaning  on 
their  long-handled  shovels  in  the  forty  nearest  the 
house.  Beyond  them  the  other  irrigators  were 
spreading  the  water  over  the  growing  crops. 

Billie  Warren  half-closed  her  eyes  and  viewed 
the  broad  expanse  of  rippling  gi'een  in  the  bot- 
toms. How  many  times  she  had  stood  here  in  the 
past  with  old  Cal  Warren  while  he  visioned  this 
very  picture  which  now  unrolled  before  her  eyes 
in  reality;  the  transformation  of  the  Three  Bar 
flat  from  a  desert  waste  to  a  scene  of  abundant 
fertility  under  the  reclaiming  touch  of  water. 

It  was  a  quiet  picture  of  farm  life  if  one  looked 
only  upon  the  blooming  fields  and  took  no  ac- 
count of  the  raw,  barren  foothills  that  flanked 
them, — the  gaunt,  towering  range  behind.  She 
found  it  difficult  to  link  the  scene  before  her  with 
the  deviltry  of  a  few  months  past.  The  killing  of 
Bangs  and  Rile  Foster's  consequent  grun  retalia- 
tion; the  raid  on  Three  Bar  bulls  and  the  stam- 
pede of  her  trail  herd;  all  those  seemed  part  of 
some  life  so  long  in  the  past  as  to  form  no  part  of 
her  present. 

The  continued  immunity  had  had  its  effect,  re- 
gardless of  her  earlier  suspicions.  She  still  real- 
ized the  possibility  of  further  raids  but  they  had 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        235 

been  so  long  delayed  that  the  prospect  had  ceased 
to  impress  her  as  imminent.  Tiny  and  Russ 
changed  their  head  of  water.  As  they  shifted  po- 
sitions she  noted  that  each  carried  some  tool  be- 
side his  irrigator's  shovel.  No  man  in  the  field 
ever  strayed  far  from  the  rifle  which  was  part  of 
his  equipment.  But  even  this  was  an  evidence  of 
vigilance  which  had  met  her  eye  every  day  for 
months  and  had  ceased  to  impress. 

They  walked  to  the  near  edge  of  the  field  and 
Harris  stooped  to  part  the  knee-deep  grain, 
pointing  to  the  slender  stems  of  alfalfa  with  their 
delicate  leaves. 

"  We  have  a  record  stand  of  young  hay,"  he 
said.  "  It's  thick  all  through — every  place  I've 
looked."  He  straightened  up  and  laughed. 
"  And  I  expect  I've  looked  at  every  acre.  I've 
been  right  interested  in  those  little  shoots.  It's 
deep-rooted  now.  The  worst  is  past.  I  don't 
see  that  anything  that  could  happen  now  would 
kill  it  out.  Next  year  we'll  put  up  a  thousand 
tons  of  hay." 

He  dropped  a  hand  on  her  shoulder  and  stood 
looking  down  at  her. 

"  Billie,  don't  you  think  it's  about  time  you 
were  finding  out  what  Judge  Colton  wants?  "  he 
asked.  "  He's  been  right  insistent  on  your  going 
beck  to  confer  with  him." 

The  girl  shook  her  head  positively.  Two 
months  before  Judffe  Colton  had  written  that  he 


236        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

must  advise  with  her  on  matters  of  importance 
and  suggested  that  she  come  on  at  once.  Harris 
had  urged  her  to  go  and  almost  daily  referred 
to  it. 

"  I  can't  go  now,"  she  said.  "  Not  till  I've 
seen  one  whole  season  through.  Wlien  the  first 
Three  Bar  crop  is  cut  and  in  the  stack  I'll  go. 
All  other  business  must  wait  till  then.  You  two 
can't  drive  me  away  till  after  I  see  that  first  crop 
in  the  stack." 

"  If  you'd  go  now  you'd  likely  get  back  before 
we're  through  cutting,"  he  urged.  "  And  the 
Judge  has  written  twice  in  the  last  two  weeks." 

Before  she  could  answer  this  a  horseman  ap- 
peared on  the  valley  road.  The  furthest  irri- 
gator, merely  a  speck  in  the  distance,  exchanged 
shovel  for  rifle  and  crossed  to  the  fence.  The 
rider,  as  if  expecting  some  such  move,  pulled  up 
his  horse  and  approached  at  a  walk. 

Harris  saw  the  two  confer.  The  horseman 
handed  some  object  to  the  other  and  urged  his 
horse  on  toward  the  house.  He  was  one  of  the 
sheriff's  deputies.  He  grinned  as  he  tapped  his 
empty  holster.  ||| 

"  One  of  your  watchdogs  lifted  my  gun,"  he 
said.    He  handed  Harris  a  note. 

After  reading  it  Harris  looked  at  his  watch 
and  snapped  it  shut,  glanced  at  the  sinking  sun 
and  turned  to  the  girl. 

"  I  have  to  make  a  little  jaunt,"  he  explained. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        237 

"Alden  wants  to  see  me.  I'll  take  Waddles 
along.  As  we  go  down  I'll  send  Russ  or  Tiny 
up  to  cook  for  the  rest." 

The  deputy  turned  his  horse  into  the  corral 
and  five  minutes  later  Harris  and  Waddles  rode 
away.  Waddles  was  mounted  on  Creamer,  the 
big  buckskin. 

"  We'll  have  to  step  right  along,"  Harris  said. 
''  It's  forty  miles." 

They  held  the  horses  to  a  stiff  swinging^ trot 
that  devoured  the  miles  without  seeming  to  tire 
iheir  mounts.  For  four  hours  they  headed  south 
rind  a  little  east,  never  slackening  their  pace  ex- 
cept to  breathe  the  horses  on  some  steep  ascent. 
The  buckskin  and  the  paint-horse  had  lost  the 
first  snap  of  their  trot  and  it  was  evident  that 
they  would  soon  begin  to  lag.  Another  hour  and 
they  had  slowed  down  perceptibly. 

The  two  men  dismounted  and  tied  the  horses 
to  the  brush  in  a  sheltered  coulee,  then  started 
across  a  broad  flat  on  foot.  Out  in  the  center 
a  spot  showed  darker  than  the  rest, — the  old  cabin 
where  Carpenter  had  elected  to  start  up  for  him- 
self after  being  discharged  from  the  Three 
IJar. 

When  within  a  hundred  yards  of  the  cabin  a 
horse,  tied  to  a  hitch  post  in  front,  neighed  shrilly 
and  Harris  laid  a  restraining  hand  on  Waddles's 
arm.  They  knelt  in  the  brush  as  the  door  opened 
and  a  man  stood  silhouetted  against  the  light. 


238        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

After  a   space   of  two   minutes    Carp's   voice 
reached  them. 

"  Not  a  sound  anywheres,"  he  said.  "  Likely 
some  horses  drifting  past."  He  went  inside  and 
closed  the  door.  The  two  men  circled  the  cabin 
and  came  up  from  the  rear.  A  window  stood 
opened  some  eight  inches  from  the  bottom. 
Through  the  holes  in  the  ragged  flour  sack  that 
served  as  a  curtain  Harris  secured  a  view  of  the 
inside.  Carp  and  Slade  sat  facing  across  a  little 
table  in  the  center  of  the  room. 

"  I  want  to  clean  up  and  go,"  Carp  was  saying. 
"  This  damn  Harris  put  me  on  the  black  list." 

"  You've  been  on  it  for  three  months,"  Slade 
said.  "  Nothing  has  happened  yet.  But  don't 
let  me  keep  you  from  pulling  out  any  time  you 
like." 

"  But  I've  got  a  settlement  to  make,"  Carp 
insisted.    "  Let's  get  that  fixed  up." 

"Settlement?"  Slade  asked>  "Settlement 
with  who?" 

Carpenter  leaned  across  the  table  and  tapped 
it  to  emphasize  his  remarks. 

"  Listen.  Morrow  gave  me  a  bill  of  sale  from 
you  calling  for  a  hundred  head  of  Three  Bar  she- 
stock,  rebranded  Triangle  on  the  hip." 

Slade  nodded  shortly. 

"  I  gave  Morrow  that  for  two  years'  back  pay 
when  he  quit.  He  could  sell  out  to  you  if  he 
liked." 


le-    — 

d 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        239 

"And  now  I  want  to  sell  out,"  Carp  said. 
"  And  be  gone  from  here." 

"  How  many  head  have  you  got? "  Slade 
asked. 

"  Three  hmidred  head,"  Carp  stated. 

"  You've  mcreased  right  fast,"  Slade  re- 
marked. "  I'd  think  you'd  want  to  stay  where 
you  was  doing  so  well.  How  much  do  you 
want? " 

"  Five  dollars  straight  through,"  Carp  said. 

"  Cheap  enough,"  Slade  answered.  "  If  only 
a  man  was  in  the  market."  He  looked  straight  at 
Carp  and  the  man's  eyes  slipped  away  from 
Slade's  steady  gaze.  "  But  I'm  not  buying. 
Likely  Morrow  will  buy  you  out." 

"  Morrow  ought  to  be  here  now,"  Carp  stated. 
*'  He's  coming  to-night." 

"  Then  I'd  better  go,"  Slade  said.  "  I  don't 
like  Morrow's  ways." 

The  thud  of  horse's  hoofs  sounded  from  close 
at  hand.  The  two  men  outside  lay  flat  in  the 
shadow  of  the  house.  A  shrill  whistle,  twice  re- 
peated, called  Carp  to  his  feet  and  he  crossed  to 
the  door  to  answer  it.  Morrow  dismounted  and 
came  to  the  door.  He  nodded  briefly  to  Slade, 
hesitating  on  the  sill  as  if  surprised  to  find  him 
there.  Carp  lost  no  time  in  stating  his  proposi- 
tion.   He  spoke  jerkily. 

"  I  want  to  get  out,"  he  said.  "  I'll  sell  for 
five  dollars  a  head." 


240        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

Morrow  held  up  a  hand  to  silence  hun. 

"  I'll  likely  buy — but  I  never  talk  business  in 
a  crowd."  He  crossed  the  room  and  sat  with  his 
back  to  the  window.    "  There's  plenty  of  time." 

"  I  take  it  I'm  the  crowd,"  Slade  remarked. 
"  So  I'll  step  out." 

Morrow  stiffened  suddenly  in  his  chair  as  a 
cold  ring  was  pressed  against  the  back  of  his  neck 
through  the  crack  of  the  window.  At  the  same 
instant  Carp  had  tilted  back  and  raised  one  knee. 
The  gun  that  rested  on  his  leg  was  peeping  over 
the  table  at  Slade. 

"  Steady!  "  he  ordered.    "  Sit  tight! " 

The  window  was  thrown  up  to  its  full  height 
by  Waddles  and  the  curtain  snatched  away  from 
the  gun  which  Harris  held  against  Morrow's 
neck.  Carp's  apparent  nervousness  had  van- 
ished. He  flipped  back  his  vest  and  revealed  a 
marshal's  badge. 

"  I'd  as  soon  take  you  along  feet  first  as  any 
way,"  he  said.  "  So  if  you  feel  like  acting  up 
you  can  start  any  time  now." 

Slade's  eyes  came  back  from  the  two  men  at 
the  window  and  rested  on  the  badge. 

"  So  that's  it,"  he  said  with  evident  relief.  "  A 
real  arrest — ^when  I  figured  it  was  an  old-fash- 
ioned murder  you  had  planned.  What  do  you 
want  with  me? " 

Waddles  had  reached  down  and  removed  Mor- 
row's gim. 


4 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        241 

"  A  number  of  things,"  Carpenter  said.  "  Ob- 
structing the  homestead  laws  for  one." 

Slade  shook  his  head  and  smiled. 

"  You've  got  the  wrong  party,"  he  said. 
'*  You  can't  prove  anything  on  me." 

"  I  don't  count  on  that,"  Carp  said.  "  You've 
covered  up  right  well.  We  know  you  work 
through  Morrow  but  can't  prove  a  word.  We've 
got  enough  to  hang  him;  but  I  expect  maybe 
you'll  get  off." 

There  was  a  scrape  of  feet  outside  the  door  and 
the  sheriff  entered  and  took  possession  of  Slade's 
gun  as  Harris  and  Waddles  moved  round  from 
the  window  and  went  inside. 

"  I'm  a  few  minutes  late,"  Alden  said.  "  I 
wasn't  right  sure  how  close  I  was  to  the  house  so 
I  left  my  horse  too  far  back." 

"  Here's  your  prisoners,"  Carp  said.  "  Cap- 
tured and  delivered  as  agreed.  I  haven't  any- 
thing on  Slade  myself  but  if  you  want  him  he's 
yours." 

"What  do  you  want  with  me?"  Slade  de- 
manded a  second  time. 

"  I'm  picking  you  up  on  complaint  make  by 
the  Three  Bar,"  Alden  said.  "  I'll  have  to  take 
you  along." 

Slade  turned  on  Harris. 

"  Wliat  charge?  "  he  asked. 

'*  Killing  twelve  Three  Bar  bulls  on  the  last 
day  of  August,"  Harris  stated. 


242        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

**  I  was  out  with  the  ranger,"  Slade  said. 
"  Back  in  the  hills.  You  know  that  yourself. 
That  charge  won't  stick." 

"  Then  maybe  it  was  the  second  of  May,"  Har- 
ris returned.    "  I  sort  of  forget." 

Slade  suddenly  grasped  the  significance  of  this 
arrest. 

"  How  many  of  you  fellows  are  pussy-footing 
round  out  here?  "  he  inquired  of  Cari3. 

"  I  don't  mind  confessing  that  several  of  the 
boys  are  riding  for  you,"  Carp  informed.  "  But 
while  we've  cinched  Morrow  we  haven't  been  able 
to  trace  it  back  to  you.  I  even  got  put  on  the 
black  list,  thinking  you  might  do  business  with 
me  direct  after  that — laiowing  my  word  wouldn't 
stand  against  yours.  But  not  you !  You've  cov- 
ered your  tracks." 

Carp  spoke  softly,  as  if  to  himself,  detailing 
his  failure  to  gather  conclusive  evidence  against 
Slade. 

"  I  even  run  your  rebrand  on  fifty  or  so  Three 
Bar  cows.  You  knew  there  wasn't  a  dollar 
changed  hands  when  Morrow  gave  me  that  paper 
which  licensed  me  to  rustle  my  own  she-stock. 
We  can't  even  prove  that  you  didn't  owe  him  two 
years'  back  pay  and  square  up  by  giving  him  that 
bill  of  sale.  There's  never  a  check  of  yours  made 
out  to  Morrow  that's  gone  through  the  bank. 
The  boys  who  staged  the  stampede  drew  down  a 
lump  sum  from  Morrow  for  the  job.    We  know 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        243 

who  was  financing  the  raid — can't  be  proved. 
The  idea  in  my  starting  up  was  to  run  your  re- 
brand  on  any  number  of  Three  Bar  cows.  Later 
Morrow  would  buy  me  out — acting  for  you; 
can't  be  proved.  Oh,  you're  in  the  clearj  all 
right." 

Slade  broke  in  upon  the  monologue.  This  reci- 
tation of  his  probable  immunity  from  conviction 
on  every  count,  far  from  reassuring  him,  served 
to  confirm  his  original  suspicion  as  to  the  reason 
for  this  arrest  without  witnesses.  If  the  sheriff 
had  wanted  him  he  had  but  to  send  word  for 
Slade  to  come  in.  He  threw  out  one  last  line  and 
the  answer  convinced  him  beyond  all  doubt. 

"  Then  a  lawyer  will  have  me  out  in  an  hour," 
he  predicted. 

"  A  lawyer  could,"  Alden  said.  "  If  you  saw 
one.  But  we've  decided  not  to  let  you  have  ac- 
cess to  legal  advice  for  the  first  few  days." 

Slade  turned  on  Carpenter. 

"  This  sort  of  thing  is  against  the  law,"  he  said. 
*'  You're  a  United  States  marshal.  How  can  you 
go  in  on  a  kidnapping  deal? " 

"  I'm  not  in  on  it,"  Carp  shrugged.  "  The 
sheriff  asked  me  to  arrest  you  at  the  first  oppor- 
tunity. I've  turned  you  over  to  him.  The  rest 
is  his  affair.  Besides,  like  I  was  mentioning,  they 
can't  prove  a  thing  on  you.  As  soon  as  they're 
convinced  of  that  they'll  turn  you  loose." 

The  sheriff  nodded  gravely. 


244        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  The  very  day  I'm  satisfied  Harris  can't  prove 
his  charges  I'll  throw  open  the  doors.  You'll  be 
a  free  man  that  minute." 

A  vision  of  the  near  future  swept  across 
Blade's  mind.  If  he  should  be  locked  up  for  three 
months  and  discharged  for  lack  of  evidence  it 
would  wreck  him  as  surely  as  the  rumors  of  the 
last  few  months  had  cut  Lang's  men  off  from  the 
rest  of  the  world.  Squatters  had  filed  on  every 
available  site  throughout  his  range  and  now 
waited  to  see  if  the  Three  Bar  would  win  its 
fight.  If  the  news  should  be  spread  that  he  was 
locked  up  these  nesters  would  rush  in.  On  his 
release  he  would  find  them  everywhere.  With 
marshals  scattered  through  the  ranks  of  his  own 
men,  intent  on  upholding  the  homestead  laws,  he 
would  be  helpless  to  drive  them  out.  The  pic- 
tures of  the  different  valleys  suitable  for  ranch 
sites,  scattered  here  and  there  over  his  extensive 
range,  traveled  through  his  mind  in  kaleidoscopic 
procession — and  he  visioned  a  squatter  outfit  es- 
tablished on  every  one.  If  they  locked  him  up 
at  this  time  he  was  lost. 

He  nodded  slowly. 

"  Well,  I  guess  you've  got  me,"  he  said.  "  I 
don't  see  that  it  will  amount  to  much,  anyway. 
Sooner  or  later  you'll  let  me  out."  He  raised 
his  arms  high  above  his  head  and  stretched.  Un- 
der cover  of  this  casual  move  he  swiftly  raised 
one  foot. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        245 

Slade  planted  his  boot  on  the  edge  of  the  light 
table  and  gave  a  tremendous  shove.  The  far 
edge  caught  the  sheriff  across  the  legs  and  over- 
threw him.  The  lantern  ci'ashed  to  the  floor  and 
at  the  same  instant  Morrow  aimed  a  sidewise, 
sweeping  kick  at  Carpenter's  ankles.  As  the 
marshal  went  down  his  head  struck  the  comer 
post  of  a  bunk  and  he  did  not  rise. 

With  a  single  sweep  jMorrow  caught  the  back 
of  his  chair  and  swung  it  above  his  head  for  the 
spot  which  Waddles  had  occupied  at  the  instant 
the  light  went  out.  The  weapon  splintered  in  his 
hands  as  it  found  its  mark,  and  as  the  big  man 
struck  the  dirt  floor  Morrow  leaped  for  the  dim 
light  which  indicated  the  open  door. 

A  huge  paw  clamped  on  one  ankle  and  a  back- 
handed wrench  sent  him  flying  across  the  room 
to  the  far  wall.  With  a  sweep  of  the  other  hand 
Waddles  slammed  the  door  with  a  bang  that 
jarred  the  cabin. 

"  We've  got  'em  trapped,"  the  big  voice  ex- 
ulted.   "  We've  got  'em  sewed  in  a  sack." 

Harris  made  one  long  reach  and  swung  the 
butt  of  his  gun  for  S lade's  head  as  the  table  went 
down  but  Slade,  with  the  same  motion,  vaulted 
the  prostrate  sheriff.  The  force  of  the  blow 
threw  Harris  off  his  balance  and  as  he  tripped 
and  reeled  to  his  knees  Slade's  boot  heel  scored  a 
glancing  blow  on  his  skull  and  floored  him.  He 
regained  his  feet,  gripping  a  fragment  of  the 


246        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

chair  Morrow  had  smashed  over  Waddles' s  head, 
and  struck  at  a  dim  form  which  loomed  against 
the  vague  light  of  the  window. 

The  shape  closed  with  him  and  he  went  down 
in  a  corner  with  Slade.  Slade  struck  him  twice  in 
the  face,  writhed  away  and  gained  his  feet,  back- 
slashing  at  Harris's  head  with  his  spurs.  Harris 
caught  a  hand-hold  in  the  long  fur  of  the  other's 
chaps,  wrapped  both  arms  round  Slade  above  the 
knees  and  dragged  him  back.  His  hand  found 
Slade's  throat  and  he  squeezed  down  on  it  as  the 
man  raised  both  knees  and  thrust  them  against 
his  stomach  to  break  the  hold.  Slade's  arm  swept 
a  circle  on  the  floor  in  search  of  the  gun  Harris 
had  dropped  but  he  was  jerked  a  foot  from  the 
floor  and  Harris  jammed  his  head  against  the 
log  wall, — jammed  again  and  Slade  crumpled 
into  a  limp  heap.  Harris  held  him  there,  unwill- 
ing to  take  a  chance  lest  the  other  might  be  feign- 
ing unconsciousness.  But  Slade  was  out  of  the 
fight. 

The  sheriff  struggled  to  his  feet  as  Waddles 
tossed  Morrow  back  from  the  door  and  slammed 
it  shut.  He  closed  with  Morrow  but  the  man 
eluded  him.  He  dared  not  shoot  with  friends 
and  enemies  struggling  all  about  the  black  pit  of 
the  little  room. 

Morrow  leaped  one  way,  then  the  opposite,  as 
the  sheriff  groped  for  him.  Alden  turned  toward 
a  rattle  at  the  stove  as  he  heard  Slade's  head 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage  ^     247 

crunch  against  the  wall  under  Harris's  savage 
thrust. 

"  Down  him! "  Waddles  roared.  "  Tear  him 
down!  Tear  him  down!  I'm  holding  the 
door." 

From  the  corner  by  the  stove  an  iron  pot 
hurtled  across  the  room  for  the  sound  of  the  voice 
and  crashed  against  the  wall  a  foot  from  his  head. 
A  second  kettle  struck  Alden  in  the  chest  and  he 
went  down.  Waddles  saw  the  light  vanish  from 
the  window,  then  reappear.  Morrow  had  made  a 
headlong  dive  through  the  little  opening. 

Waddles  swung  back  the  door  and  sprang  out- 
side as  Morrow  vaulted  to  the  saddle.  The  big 
man  lunged  and  tackled  both  horse  and  man  as  a 
grizzly  would  seek  to  batter  down  his  prey. 

The  frightened  horse  struck  at  him,  numbing 
one  leg  with  the  blow  of  an  iron-shod  forefoot, 
then  reared  and  wheeled  away  from  the  thing 
which  sprang  at  him,  but  Waddles  retained  his 
grip  in  the  animal's  mane,  his  otjier  hand  clamped 
on  Morrow's  ankle. 

The  rider  leaned  and  struck  him  in  the  head. 
The  crazed  horse  shook  Waddles  off  but  as  he 
fell  the  other  man  fell  with  him,  dragged  from 
the  saddle  by  the  jerk  of  one  mighty  hand.  They 
rolled  apart  and  Morrow  leaped  to  his  feet  but 
Waddles  had  wrenched  the  leg  already  numbed 
by  the  striking  horse  and  it  buckled  under  him 
and  let  him  back  to  the  ground  as  he  put  his 


248        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

weight  on  it.  He  reached  for  his  gun.  A  form 
loomed  above  him,  a  heavy  rock  upraised  in  both 
hands.  The  gun  barked  just  as  a  downward 
sweep  of  the  arms  started  the  rock  for  his  head. 
Morrow  pitched  down  across  him  and  Waddles 
swept  him  aside  with  a  single  thrust. 

He  rose  and  stirred  the  limp  shape  with  his 
toe  as  the  sheriff  reached  his  side. 

"Dead  bird!"  Waddles  announced  and 
turned  to  limp  back  to  the  cabin. 

A  match  flared  inside  as  Harris  lighted  the 
lantern.  Carpenter  stirred  and  sat  up,  moving 
one  hand  along  the  gash  in  his  scalp.  The  sheriff 
stooped  and  snapped  a  pair  of  handcuffs  on 
Slade's  wrists.  They  splashed  water  on  his  face 
and  he  opened  his  eyes.  He  regarded  the  steel 
bracelets  at  his  wrists  as  he  was  helped  to  his  feet 
and  turned  to  Harris. 

"  Don't  forget  that  I'll  kill  you  for  this,"  he 
said.  It  was  a  simple  statement,  made  without 
heat  or  bluster,  and  aside  from  this  one  remark 
he  failed  to  speak  a  syllable  until  the  sheriff  rode 
away  with  him. 

The  sheriff  waved  the  lantern  outside  the  door 
and  before  he  lowered  it  two  deputies  rode  up, 
leading  his  horse. 

"  We  started  at  that  shot,"  one  of  them  an- 
nounced in  explanation  of  their  prompt  arrival. 

Alden  motioned  Slade  to  his  horse  and  helped 
him  up. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        249 

"  Shoot  him  out  of  the  saddle  if  he  makes  a 
break,"  he  ordered  briefly. 

"  Now  you  can  move  against  those  men  I've 
SM^orn  out  complaints  for,"  Harris  said  to  Alden. 
"  Public  sentiment  has  turned  against  them  to 
such  an  extent  that  they  won't  get  any  help — and 
there  won't  be  any  to  fill  their  places,  once  we've 
cleaned  them  up.  Deputize  the  whole  Three  Bar 
crew  when  you're  ready  to  start." 

The  sheriff  nodded  and  led  the  way  with  the 
two  deputies  riding  close  behind,  one  riding  on 
either  side  of  Slade. 


XIV 

The  freight  wagons  rattled  away  from  the 
Three  Bar  as  the  first  light  showed  in  the  east, 
and  the  grind  of  wheels  on  gravel  died  out  in  the 
distance  as  Harris  and  Billie  finished  their  break- 
fast. 

They  walked  to  the  mouth  of  the  lane  and 
watched  the  light  driving  the  shadows  from  the 
valleys.  A  score  of  times  they  had  stood  so,  never 
tiring  of  the  view  afforded  from  this  spot,  a  view 
which  spoke  of  Three  Bar  progress  and  future 
prosperity.  The  hands  had  come  in  from  the 
round-up  the  night  before,  prior  to  the  return  of 
Harris  and  Waddles  from  their  mysterious  two- 
day  trip  in  response  to  the  sheriff's  message,  and 
Evans  had  led  them  to  Brill's  for  a  night  of  play. 
They  were  due  back  at  the  ranch  in  the  early 
forenoon  and  Harris  had  allowed  the  freighters 
to  depart  before  the  others  arrived. 

"  We'll  be  short  of  guards  for  the  next  hour 
or  two,"  he  said.  "  Till  the  boys  get  back  from 
Brill's — but  they'll  be  rocking  in  most  any  time 
now." 

"  What  did  Alden  want?  "  she  asked,  referring 
to  the  trip  from  which  he  and  Waddles  had  re- 
turned late  the  night  before. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        251 

"  We  made  a  call  on  Carp,"  he  said.  "  He  had 
some  good  news  we've  been  waiting  for." 

"  Then  Carp  is  a  Three  Bar  plant,"  she  said. 

"  He's  a  U.  S.  plant,"  Harris  corrected.  "  But 
he's  been  working  in  with  us  to  get  something  on 
Slade — to  gather  proof  that  he's  behind  these 
squatter  raids  of  the  last  few  years  and  the  ones 
they've  aimed  at  us  up  to  date.  He  couldn't  get 
a  shred  that  would  hold  in  court.  But  Slade  is 
almost  through.    His  claws  are  clipped." 

The  girl  started  to  question  him  as  to  Carp's 
activities  but  after  the  first  sentence  she  became 
aware  that  his  attention  was  riveted  on  something 
other  than  her  words.  He  had  thrown  up  his 
head  like  a  startled  buck  and  was  peering  down 
the  valle3^ 

Her  range-bred  ears  caught  and  correctly  in- 
tcTpreted  the  sound  which  had  roused  him.  A 
distant  rumble  reached  her  and  the  surface  of  the 
earth  seemed  to  vibrate  faintly  beneath  her  feet. 
She  knew  the  jar  for  the  pounding  of  thousands 
of  hoofs,  the  drone  for  the  far-off  bawling  of 
fi'ightened  cows.  A  low  black  line  filled  the  val- 
ley from  side  to  side,  rushing  straight  on  up 
tlie  gently-sloping  bottoms  for  the  Three  Bar 
flat. 

"  They're  on  us,"  Harris  said.  "  I  might  have 
known.    Get  back  to  the  house — quick !  " 

As  they  ran  she  noticed  that  his  eyes  were  no  I 
upon  the  surging  mass  of  cows  in  the  valley  but 


252        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

were  trained  on  the  broken  slopes  back  of  the 
house. 

"  Anyway,  they  don't  want  you,"  he  said. 
"  We'll  do  the  best  we  can." 

Waddles  stood  in  the  door  of  the  cookhouse,  his 
big  face  flushed  with  wrath  as  he  gazed  at  the  on- 
coming sea  of  cows.  He  reached  up  and  took 
the  shotgun  which  reposed  on  two  pegs  above  the 
door. 

He  slammed  the  heavy  door  and  dropped  the 
bar  as  they  sprang  inside. 

"  I  made  that  prediction  about  clipping  Slade's 
claws  too  soon,"  Harris  said.  "  What  with  Slade 
locked  up  and  Morrow  six  feet  undergi'ound,  I 
was  overconfident.  I  might  have  known  it  was 
planned  ahead." 

His  face  was  lined  with  anxiety,  an  expression 
she  had  never  before  seen  him  wear  even  in  the 
face  of  emergency.  She  had  no  time  to  question 
him  about  the  assertions  relative  to  Morrow  and 
Slade. 

The  front  rank  of  the  stampede  was  bearing 
down  on  the  lower  fence.  The  barrier  went  down 
as  so  much  spider  web  before  the  drive;  posts 
were  broken  short,  wire  was  snapped  and 
dragged,  and  three  thousand  head  of  cows 
pounded  on  across  the  meadows. 

The  girl  had  a  sickening  realization  that  the 
work  of  a  year  would  be  blotted  out  in  a  space  of 
seconds  under  those  churning  hoofs.    It  seemed 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        253 

that  she  must  die  of  ^heer  grief  as  she  witnessed 
the  complete  devastation  of  the  fields  she  had 
watched  day  by  day  with  such  loving  care.  The 
stampede  swept  the  full  length  of  the  meadow 
and  held  on  for  the  house.  The  acute  stab  of  her 
g]-ief  was  dulled  and  replaced  by  a  mental  leth- 
aigy.  The  worst  had  happened  and  she  viewed 
the  rest  of  the  scene  with  something  akin  to  in- 
difference. 

The  foremost  cows  struck  the  corrals  and  they 
went  down  with  a  splintering  crash  under  the 
p]'essure  from  behind.  She  looked  out  on  a  sea 
of  tossing  horns  and  heaving  backs  as  the  herd 
rvished  through,  the  heavy  log  buildings  shaking 
from  the  mass  of  animals  jammed  against  them 
and  squeezing  past. 

The  force  of  the  run  was  spent  on  the  steep 
slope  back  of  the  house  and  the  herd  split 
into  detachments  and  moved  off  through  the 
hi  Is. 

The  west  side  of  the  house  was  windowless,  a 
blank  wall  built  against  the  standing  winds, 
l^'addles  was  busily  engaged  in  knocking  out  a 
pf  tch  of  chinking  and  endeavoring  to  work  a 
loophole  between  the  logs.  Harris  was  similarly 
engaged  between  two  windows  which  overlooked 
the  blacksmith  shop,  storerooms  and  saddle  room 
th.it  formed  a  solid  line  of  buildings  a  hundred 
yards  to  the  east.  She  reflected  hazily  that  there 
wfLS  little  cause  for  such  petty  activity  when  the 


254        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

worst  had  happened  and  the  Three  Bar  had  suf- 
fered an  uTeparable  loss. 

Harris  j)ointed  down  the  valley  to  the  south 
and  she  turned  mechanically  and  crossed  to  that 
window.  A  few  riders  showed  on  the  ridges  on 
either  flank  of  the  valley. 

"  They  were  cached  up  there  to  pick  us  off  if 
we  rode  down  to  try  and  turn  the  run,"  he  said. 
"  If  it  had  been  light  they  might  have  opened  on 
the  wagons.  But  they  knew  the  rest  hadn't 
started  the  cows." 

She  nodded  without  apparent  interest.  What 
might  transpire  now  seemed  a  matter  to  be 
viewed  with  indifference. 

"  It's  time  for  me  to  go,"  Harris  said.  "  I'll 
hold  the  bunk  house.  Good  luck,  Billie — we'll 
hold  'em  off." 

He  turned  to  Waddles  who  still  worked  to 
make  a  loophole  through  the  blank  wall. 

"  If  it  gets  too  hot  put  her  outside  and  tell  her 
to  give  herself  up.  Even  Lang  would  know  that 
the  whole  country  would  be  hunting  them  to-mor- 
row if  they  touched  her.  They  won't  if  they  can 
help  it.  But  this  is  their  last  hope — to  trust  in  one 
final  raid.  They'll  go  through  with  it.  Make 
her  go  outside  if  it  comes  to  that." 

He  opened  the  door  and  leaped  across  the 
twenty  yards  of  open  space  which  separated  the 
main  building  from  the  bunk  house.  The  fact 
that  no  rifle  balls  searched  for  him  as  he  sprang 


Ji 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        255 

inside  was  sufficient  testimony  that  the  raiders 
who  might  be  posted  in  the  hills  back  of  the  house 
were  not  yet  within  easy  range.  He  barred  the 
door  and  looked  from  the  south  window.  The 
riders  along  the  valley  rims  had  descended  to  the 
bottoms.  Smoke  was  ali^eady  rising  from  one 
homestead  cabin  and  they  were  riding  toward  the 
rest.    Two  men  had  dismounted  by  the  head  gate. 

Harris  cursed  himself  for  not  having  antici- 
pated this  very  thing.  The  whole  plan  was  clear 
to  him.  Slade  would  have  known  of  the  imple- 
ments at  the  railroad  waiting  to  be  freighted  in. 
lEe  would  have  known,  too,  that  when  the  cow- 
hands came  in  from  the  round-up  there  would 
follow  the  inevitable  night  at  Brill's.  Morrow 
had  mapped  out  the  raid  long  in  advance,  engag- 
ing Lang  to  gather  the  cows  throughout  the  first 
night  the  round-up  crew  was  in  from  the  range 
and  hold  them  a  few  miles  from  the  ranch.  In 
case  the  freighters  failed  to  leave  before  the 
others  came  back  from  Brill's  the  raid  would  have 
been  staged  just  the  same;  men  cached  along  the 
lip  of  the  valley  to  pick  off  all  those  who  should 
attempt  to  ride  down  and  turn  the  run;  others 
ready  to  slip  down  from  behind  and  torch  the 
buildings  while  the  fight  was  going  on  in  the  flat. 
Lang  could  not  know  that  Slade  was  locked  up 
and  that  Morrow  was  dead  so  the  raid  had  gone 
through  as  planned. 

Smoke  was  rising  from  two  more  cabins  in  the 


256        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

flats  and  Harris  reproached  himself  for  another 
oversight  in  allowing  the  wagons  to  pull  out  be- 
fore the  others  arrived.  The  crop  would  have 
been  ruined  in  any  event  but  with  the  hands  at 
home  they  could  have  prevented  the  destruction 
of  the  cabins. 

He  turned  to  the  opposite  side  and  scanned  the 
face  of  the  hills  for  signs  of  life.  Not  a  sage 
quivered  to  show  the  position  of  bodies  crawling 
through  the  brush;  no  rattle  of  gravel  indicated 
the  presence  of  men  working  down  through  any 
of  the  sheltered  coulees  behind ;  yet  he  knew  they 
were  near.  The  silence  was  in  sharp  contrast  to 
the  rumble  and  roar  of  the  stampede  just  past. 
The  only  sounds  which  shattered  the  quiet  were 
the  muffled  thuds  of  Waddles's  hand-axe  as  the 
cook  worked  on  a  single  idea  and  endeavored  to 
gouge  a  loophole  through  the  cracks  of  the 
twelve-inch  logs.  Harris  transferred  his  atten- 
tion to  the  long  line  of  log  buildings  a  hundred 
yards  to  the  east.  The  row  afforded  perfect 
cover  for  any  w^ho  chose  that  route  of  approach. 
They  could  walk  up  to  them  in  absolute  safety, 
screened  both  from  himself  and  those  in  the  mahi 
house. 

As  he  watched  the  doors  and  window^s  for  sign 
of  movement  within  a  voice  hailed  them  from  the 
shop. 

"  You  might  as  well  come  out,"  it  called. 
"  We're  going  to  fire  the  plant." 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        257 

Harris  stretched  prone  on  the  floor  and  rested 
the  muzzle  of  his  rifle  on  a  crack  between  the  logs. 
li  was  hard  shooting.  He  was  forced  to  shift  the 
butt  end  of  the  gun,  moving  with  it  himself  to 
li]ie  the  sights  instead  of  swinging  the  free  end  of 
the  barrel.  He  trained  it  on  a  crack  some  two 
f ( et  from  the  door  of  the  shop.  Behind  the  aper- 
ture the  light  of  a  window  on  the  far  side  showed 
faintly. 

"  Come  out ! "  the  voice  ordered.  "  Or  we'll 
cook  you  inside.  We've  no  time  to  lose.  Rush 
it!" 

The  light  disappeared  from  the  crack  and  Har- 
ris pressed  the  trigger.  With  the  roar  of  his  gun 
a  shape  pitched  down  across  the  door  of  the  shop. 
Some  unseen  hands  caught  the  man  by  the  feet 
and  as  he  was  dragged  back  from  sight  Harris 
saw  the  red  handkerchief  which  had  served  as  a 
mask. 

From  all  along  the  row  of  buildings  a  fire  was 
oi)ened  on  the  bunk  house.  Apparently  one  man 
was  detailed  to  search  out  a  certain  crevice  be- 
tv/een  the  logs.  Harris  threw  himself  flat  against 
the  lower  log  which  barely  shielded  him.  One 
rifleman  covered  a  crack  breast-high,  another  the 
ore  next  below,  drilling  it  at  six-inch  intervals. 
Slireds  of  'dobe  chinking  littered  the  room.  The 
balls  which  found  an  entrance  splintered  through 
the  bunks  and  buried  themselves  in  the  logs  of  the 
far  wall.    A  third  marksman  worked  on  the  lower 


258        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

erack.  Puffs  of  'dobe  pulverized  before  Harris's 
eyes  as  the  systematic  fire  crept  toward  him  down 
the  crack  in  six-inch  steps. 

A  flash  of  dust  a  few  inches  before  his  nose 
half  blinded  him.  The  next  shot  drilled  through 
an  inch  above  his  head,  flattened  sidewise  on  the 
floor,  and  a  fragment  of  shell- jacket,  stripped  in 
passing  through,  scored  his  cheek  and  nicked  his 
ear.  The  next  fanned  his  shirt  across  the  shoul- 
ders and  the  biting  scraps  of  'dobe  stung  his  back. 

The  shooting  suddenly  ceased.  Billie  Warren, 
dazedly  indifferent  as  to  what  should  happen  to 
the  Three  Bar  since  the  wreck  of  the  lower  field, 
had  roused  to  action  the  instant  she  saw  the  spurts 
of  chinking  fly  from  the  cracks  of  the  bunk  house 
before  the  fusillade  sent  after  Harris.  She  threw 
open  the  door  and  stepped  out,  holding  up  one 
hand. 

"Don't  kill  him!"  she  commanded.  "If 
you  fire  another  shot  at  him  I'll  put  up  every  dol- 
lar I  own  to  hang  every  man  that  ever  rode  a 
foot  with  Lang !    Do  you  hear  that,  Lang?  " 

"  Lang's  in  Idaho,"  a  voice  growled  surlily 
from  the  shop.  "  None  of  us  ever  rode  with 
Lang.  We're  from  every  brand  on  the  range — 
and  we're  going  to  burn  you  squatters  out." 

"  Draw  off  and  let  us  ride  away,"  she  said. 
"  You  can  have  the  Three  Bar." 

"  All  but  Harris,"  the  voice  called  back.  "  He 
stays ! " 


I 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        259 

She  threw  up  the  rifle  she  carried  and  touched 
it  off  at  a  crack  near  the  shop  door.  As  the 
s])linters  flew  from  the  edge  of  the  log  a  figure 
sjDrang  past  the  door  for  the  safety  of  the  oppo- 
site side  and  she  shot  again,  then  emptied  the 
magazine  at  a  crevice  on  the  side  where  he  had 
taken  refuge. 

"  Get  back  inside,  damn  you!  "  a  voice  shouted. 
"  We're  going  to  wreck  the  Three  Bar — and  you 
with  it  if  you  stand  in  the  way.  Get  back  out  of 
liie!" 

Harris  knew  that  the  men  would  not  be  de- 
terred in  their  purpose — ^would  sacrifice  her 
along  with  the  rest  if  necessary  to  accomplish 
tlieir  end. 

"  Get  back,  Billie,"  he  called  from  the  bunk 
house.  "  You  can't  do  us  any  good  out  there. 
Take  the  little  cabin  and  sit  tight.  We'll  beat 
them  off." 

A  haze  of  smoke  showed  through  the  store- 
room door,  a  bright  tongue  of  flame  leaping  back 
of  it. 

She  turned  to  the  door  but  Waddles  had  barred 
it  behind  her. 

"  Take  the  little  house.  Pet,"  he  urged.  "  Like 
Cal  said.  You'll  be  safe  enough.  We'll  give  'em 
hell." 

She  walked  to  the  little  cabin  that  stood  iso- 
lated and  alone,  the  first  building  ever  erected  on 
the  Three   Bar  and  which  had  sheltered  the 


26o        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

Harrises  before  her  father  had  taken  over  the 
brand. 

The  smoke  had  spread  all  along  the  row  of 
buildings  and  hung  in  an  oily  black  cloud  above 
them,  the  hungry  flames  licking  up  the  sides  of 
the  dry  logs.  The  men  had  withdrawn  after  put- 
ting the  torch  to  the  row  in  a  dozen  spots. 

From  her  point  of  vantage  she  saw  two  masked 
men  rise  from  the  brush  and  run  swiftly  down 
toward  the  main  house,  each  carrying  a  can.  She 
divined  their  purpose  instantly. 

"Watch  the  west  side!"  she  called.  "The 
west  side — quick." 

The  sound  of  Waddles's  hand-axe  ceased  and 
an  instant  later  the  roar  of  the  shotgun  sounded 
twice  from  within  the  house,  followed  by  the 
cook's  lament. 

"  Missed!  "  the  big  voice  wailed.  "  Two  min- 
utes more  and  I'd  have  made  a  real  hole." 

The  muffled  crash  of  a  rifle  rolled  steadily  from 
the  house  as  Waddles  fired  at  the  chinking  in  an 
effort  to  reach  the  two  men  outside.  But  they 
had  accomplished  their  purpose  and  retreated, 
the  house  shielding  them  from  Harris's  field  of 
view ;  and  they  kept  on  the  same  line,  out  of  sight 
of  the  bunk  house,  till  they  reached  a  deep  coulee 
which  afforded  a  safe  route  of  retreat. 

The  row  of  buildings  was  a  seething  mass  of 
flames  rolling  up  into  the  black  smoke.  Flames 
hissed  and  licked  up  the  blank  wall  of  the  main 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        261 

House,  traveling  along  the  logs  on  which  the  two 
masked  raiders  had  thrown  their  cans  of  oil.  The 
men  outside  had  only  to  wait  until  the  occupants 
were  roasted  out.  A  stiff  wind  held  from  the 
west  and  once  the  house  was  in  flames  they  would 
be  driven  down  upon  the  bunk  house  and  fire  it  in 
turn.  She  loiew  Waddles  would  come  out  when 
it  grew  too  hot.  The  raiders  might  let  him  go. 
It  was  Harris  they  waited  for. 

The  girl  ran  across  and  pounded  on  the  bunk- 
house  door. 

"  Run  for  it,"  she  begged.  "  Make  a  run  for 
the  brush!  I'll  keep  between  you  and  them. 
They  won't  shoot  me.  You  can  get  to  the  brush. 
There's  a  chance  that  way." 

"  All  right,  old  girl,"  Harris  said.  "  In  a  min- 
ute now.  But  you  go  back,  Billie.  Get  back  to 
the  Jittle  house.  As  soon  as  it  gets  hot  I'll  run  for 
it.  I've  got  ten  minutes  yet  before  I'm  roasted 
out.    I'll  start  as  soon  as  you're  inside  the  house." 

"  No.  Start  now !  "  she  implored.  The  flames 
were  sliding  along  one  side  of  the  house  and  even 
now  she  could  feel  the  heat  of  them  fanned  down 
upon  the  bunk  house  by  the  wind.  "  Run,  Cal," 
she  entreated.  "  Run  while  you've  got  a  chance." 
She  leaned  upon  the  door  and  beat  on  it  with  her 
fists. 

"  All  right,  Billie,"  he  said.  "  I'll  go.  You 
Kstav  right  where  you  are  as  if  you're  talking  to 
me>' 


262        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

She  heard  him  cross  the  floor.  He  dropped 
from  the  window  on  the  far  side  from  the  men. 
When  he  came  in  sight  of  them  he  was  running 
in  long  leaps  for  the  brush,  zigzagging  in  his 
flight.  Their  gaze  had  been  riveted  on  the  girl 
and  he  gained  a  flying  start  of  thirty  yards  before 
a  shot  was  fired.  Then  half  a  dozen  rifles  spurted 
from  two  himdred  yards  up  the  slope,  the  balls 
passing  him  with  nasty  snaps.  He  reached  the 
edge  of  the  sage  and  plunged  headlong  between 
two  rocks.  Bullets  reached  for  him,  ripping 
through  the  tips  of  the  sage  above  him,  tossing  up 
spurts  of  gravel  on  all  sides  and  singing  in  rico- 
chets from  the  rocks. 

One  raider,  in  his  eagerness  to  secure  a  better 
view,  incautiously  exposed  his  head.  He  went 
down  with  a  hole  through  his  mask  as  a  shot 
sounded  from  the  main  house.  From  the  win- 
dow, his  big  face  red  and  dripping  from  the  heat, 
Waddles  pumped  a  rifle  and  covered  Harris's 
flight  as  best  he  could,  drilling  the  center  of  every 
sage  that  shook  or  quivered  back  of  the  house. 

Two  men  turned  their  attention  to  the  one  who 
handicapped  their  chances  of  locating  the  crawl- 
ing man  and  poured  their  fire  through  the  win- 
dow. A  soft-nose  splintered  the  butt  of  the 
cook's  rifle  and  tore  a  strip  of  meat  from  his  arm 
as  another  fanned  his  cheek.  He  dropped  to  the 
floor  and  peered  from  a  crack.  The  firing  had 
suddenly  ceased.     He  saw  a  hat  moving  up  a 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        263 

coulee,  a  mere  flash  here  and  there  above  the 
sage  as  the  owner  of  it  ran.  As  he  watched  for 
the  man  to  reapx^ear,  the  roof  of  the  whole  string 
of  buildings  to  the  east  caved  with  a  hissing  roar 
and  belched  sparks  and  debris  high  in  the  air. 

The  fire  was  filtering  through  the  cracks  and 
circling  its  hmigry  tongues  inside.  The  smoke 
hurt  his  eyes  and  the  heat  seemed  to  crack  his 
slvin.  He  crossed  over  to  see  if  Harris  was  do^vn ; 
that  would  account  for  the  sudden  cessation  of 
shooting  from  the  hills  back  of  the  house. 

The  raiders  in  the  lower  field  were  riding 
sv^iftly  for  the  far  side  of  the  valley.  One  man 
knelt  near  the  head  gate,  then  mounted  and 
jiLmped  his  horse  off  after  the  rest.  Waddles 
put  the  whole  force  of  his  lungs  behind  one 
mighty  cheer. 

Fifty  yards  back  in  the  brush  Harris  cau- 
tiously raised  his  head  to  determine  the  cause  of 
this  triumphant  peal. 

Far  down  along  the  rim  of  the  valley,  outlined 
against  the  sky,  four  mules  were  running  as  so 
many  startled  deer  under  the  bite  of  the  lash  and 
six  men  swayed  and  clung  in  the  wagon  that 
lurched  behind.  High  above  the  crackle  of  the 
flfimes  sounded  Tiny's  yelps,  keen  and  clear,  as 
he  urged  on  the  flying  mules.  Three  men  un- 
loaded from  the  wagon  as  it  came  opposite  the 
chister  of  men  riding  far  out  across  the  flats. 
They  opened  a  long-range  fire  at  a  thousand 


264        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

yards  while  the  others  stayed  with  the  wagon  as 
it  rocked  on  toward  the  burning  ranch. 

Billie  was  running  to  the  brush  at  the  spot 
where  Harris  had  disappeared.  He  rose  to  meet 
her. 

"  Cal,  you're  not  hurt? "  she  asked. 

"  Not  a  scratch,"  he  said.     "  Thanks  to  you." 

In  her  relief  she  grasped  his  arm  and  gave  it  a 
fierce  little  squeeze. 

"  Then  it's  all  right,"  she  said. 

Waddles  burst  from  the  door  of  the  burning 
house,  his  arms  piled  high  with  salvage. 

"We'll  save  what  we  can,"  Harris  said  and 
started  for  the  house.  As  he  ran  the  valley 
rocked  with  a  concussion  which  nearly  threw  him 
flat  and  a  column  of  fragments  and  trash  rose  a 
hundred  feet  above  the  spot  where  the  head  gate 
had  been  but  a  second  past. 

A  dozen  running  horses  flipped  over  the  edge 
of  the  hill  and  plunged  down  toward  the  ranch. 
The  men  were  back  from  Brill's.  Tiny  halted 
the  mules  on  the  lip  of  the  valley  and  the  three 
men  came  down  the  slope  on  foot. 

Harris  held  up  his  hand  to  halt  the  riders  as 
they  would  have  kept  on  past  the  house.  He 
knew  that  the  raiders  stationed  behind  the  ranch 
had  long  since  reached  their  horses  and  were  lost 
in  the  choppy  hills.  He  waved  all  hands  toward 
the  buildings  and  they  swarmed  inside,  carrying 
out  load  after    load  of  such  articles  as  could 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        265 

be  moved  and  piling  them  out  of  reach  of  the 
flames. 

The  girl  sat  apart  and  watched  them  work. 
Her  lethargy  had  retm^ned.  It  seemed  a  small 
matter  to  rescue  these  trinkets  when  the  Three 
Ear  was  a  total  wreck.  The  wind  fanned  the 
flames  down  on  the  bunk  house  and  one  side  was 
charred  and  smoking.  The  men  drew  back  from 
tl  e  heat.  Tiny  spurts  of  fire  flickered  along  the 
charred  side.     Then  it  burst  into  a  sheet  of  flame. 

Harris  spoke  briefly  to  Evans  and  the  tall  man 
nodded  as  he  itemized  the  orders  in  his  mind. 

"  Now  I'll  get  her  away  from  here,"  Harris 
said.  "  It's  hell  for  her  to  just  sit  there  and 
watch  it  burn." 

He  caught  two  of  the  saddled  horses  that  had 
carried  the  men  from  Brill's  and  crossed  over  to 
where  she  sat. 

"  Let's  ride  down  to  the  field,"  he  said.  "And 
see  what's  got  to  be  done.  I  expect  a  week's 
work  will  repair  that  part  of  it  all  right." 

She  gazed  at  him  in  amazement.  He  spoke  of 
repairing  the  damage  while  the  Three  Bar 
burned  before  his  eyes.  But  she  rose  and 
mounted  the  horse.  He  shortened  her  stirrup 
straps  and  they  rode  off  down  what  had  once 
been  the  lane,  the  fence  flattened  by  the  rushing 
he  rde  of  cattle  that  had  swept  through. 

The  homestead  cabins  smoked  but  still  stood 
incact. 


266        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

"  Look!  "  he  urged  cheerfully.  "  Those  logs 
were  too  green  to  burn.  We  won't  even  have  to 
rebuild.  They'll  look  a  little  charred  round  the 
edges  maybe,  but  otherwise  as  good  as  new." 

Behind  her  sounded  a  gurgling  roar  as  the  roof 
of  the  main  house  fell  but  Harris  did  not  even 
look  back. 

"  We  can  restring  that  fence  in  a  right  short 
while,"  he  asserted.  "  We've  lost  one  crop  of 
oat-hay — ^which  we  didn't  much  need,  anyhow. 
That  young  alfalfa  is  too  deep  rooted  to  be  much 
hurt.  Next  spring  it'll  come  out  thick,  a  heavy 
stand  of  hay ;  and  we'll  cut  a  thousand  tons." 

They  rode  across  fields  trampled  flat  by  thou- 
sands of  churning  hoofs  and  reached  the  spot 
where  the  head  gate  had  been,  a  yawning  hole  at 
which  the  water  sucked  and  tore.  A  section  of 
the  bank  caved  and  was  washed  away.  And 
through  it  all  he  planned  the  work  of  reconstruc- 
tion and  the  transformation  which  would  be  ef- 
fected inside  a  year, — while  behind  them  the 
home  ranch  was  ablaze. 

"  We're  not  bad  hurt,"  he  said.  "  They  can't 
hurt  our  land.  I'd  rather  have  this  flat  right 
now — the  way  it  stands — than  three  thousand 
head  of  cows  on  the  range  and  no  land  at  all. 
We  can  rebuild  the  place  this  winter  while  work 
is  slack.  Build  better  than  before.  Those  build- 
ings were  pretty  old,  at  best.  There'll  be  enough 
hungry  cowhands  riding  grub-line  at  the  Three 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        267 

Bar  to  rebuild  it  in  two  months.     Every  man 
that  feeds  on  us  this  winter  will  have  to  work." 

His  enthusiasm  failed  to  touch  her.  For  her 
the  Three  Bar  was  wrecked,  the  old  home  gone, 
and  her  gaze  kept  straying  back  to  the  eddying 
black  smoke-cloud  at  the  foot  of  the  hills. 


XV 

They  rode  from  the  devastated  fields  and  an- 
gled southwest  across  the  range.  Harris  pointed 
out  the  calves  along  their  course. 

"  Look  at  those  chunky  little  youngsters/*  he 
said.  "  Nearly  every  one  is  good  red  stock. 
Only  a  scattering  few  that  threw  back  to  off -color 
shades.  This  grading-up  process  doesn't  take 
long  to  show." 

When  some  ten  miles  from  the  Three  Bar 
he  dismounted  on  a  ridge  and  she  joined  him,  lis- 
tening with  entire  indifference  to  his  optimistic 
plans. 

"  We're  only  scratched,"  he  said.  "  It  won't 
matter  in  the  end." 

"  This  is  the  end,"  she  dissented.  "  The  Three 
Bar  is  done." 

"  It's  just  the  start,"  he  returned.  "  It's  the 
end  for  them!  Don't  you  see?  They  staked 
everything  on  one  big  raid  that  would  smash  the 
Three  Bar  and  discourage  the  rest  from  dupli- 
cating our  move.  That  would  give  Slade  a  new 
lease  of  life — delay  the  inevitable  for  a  few  more 
years.     They  made  one  final  attempt  and  lost." 

"  Did  they  lose?  "  she  inquired.  "  I  thought 
they'd  won." 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        269 

"They're  through  1"  he  asserted  positively. 
"  Slade  is  locked  up.  Inside  of  a  week  the  sher- 
iff would  have  cleaned  out  the  Breaks.  It  was 
my  fault  this  happened.  With  Slade  locked  up 
and  Morrow  dead  it  didn't  occur  to  me  that  any- 
thing was  planned  ahead.  If  the  albino  had  lived 
he'd  never  have  run  his  neck  into  a  noose  by  a  raid 
like  this.  But  Lang  was  born  without  brains. 
Slade  could  hire  him  for  anything." 

"Can  you  prove  this  on  Slade?"  she  de- 
manded. It  was  the  first  sign  of  interest  she  had 
shown.  Deep  under  her  numbed  indifference  a 
thought  persisted, — a  hope  that  Slade,  the  man 
who  had  brought  about  the  raid,  should  be  made 
to  pay.    Harris  shook  his  head. 

"  As  usual,  Slade's  in  the  clear,"  he  said. 
"  There's  been  a  rumor  afloat  which  would  be 
considered  sufficient  cause  for  Lang's  men  to  raid 
the;  Three  Bar  without  other  incentive." 

He  resumed  his  glowing  plans  for  reconstruc- 
tion. 

"That's  their  last  shot,"  he  said.  "We're 
only  delayed — that's  all.  We  lost  a  few  fences. 
Posts  are  free  for  the  cutting  and  most  of  the 
wire  can  be  restrung.  New  wire  is  cheap.  The 
corral  poles  are  scattered  right  on  the  spot;  only 
the  posts  broken  off.  We  can  set  more  posts  and 
throw  up  the  new  corrals  in  two  days.  The 
horiestead  cabins  are  only  charred.  The  old 
buildings  at  the  ranch  are  gone.     I'll  put  a  crew 


270        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

in  the  hills  getting  out  new  logs  and  there'll  be 
enough  out-of-job  peelers  riding  gTub-line  to  re- 
build the  whole  place.  We  can  put  up  a  few 
tents  for  the  hands  till  the  new  bunk  house  is 
built.  We've  got  our  land.  The  hay  is  tramped 
flat  right  now  but  the  roots  aren't  hurt.  Next 
spring  will  show  the  whole  flat  coming  up  with  a 
heavy  stand  of  hay." 

"  You're  a  good  partner,  Cal,"  she  said. 
"  You've  done  your  best.  But  the  whole  thing 
would  only  happen  over  again.  Slade's  too 
strong  for  us." 

"  Slade's  through!  "  he  asserted  again.  "  He's 
locked  up  and  when  he  gets  out  his  hands  will  be 
tied.  Inside  of  a  month  the  law  will  be  in  the 
saddle  for  the  first  time  in  years.  Public  senti- 
ment is  running  that  way.  All  it  ever  needed 
was  a  start.  Once  Alden  gets  a  grip  on  things, 
with  folks  behind  him,  he'll  never  lose  it  again. 
From  now  on  you'll  see  every  wild  one  cut  short 
in  his  career.  Folks  will  be  busy  pointing  them 
out  instead  of  helping  them  cover  it  up." 

He  painted  the  future  of  the  Three  Bar  as  the 
foremost  outfit  within  a  hundred  miles,  but  her 
mind  was  busy  with  a  future  so  entirely  different 
from  the  one  he  portrayed  that  she  scarcely 
grasped  his  words.  She  felt  a  vague  sense  of  re- 
lief that  there  was  no  decision  for  her  to  make.  It 
had  been  made  for  her  and  against  her  will,  but 
it  was  done.     Always  she  had  heard  her  parents 


Ji 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        271 

sjjeak  of  the  day  when  they  should  go  back  home; 
and  she  had  always  felt  that  the  day  would  come 
when  she  too  would  live  in  the  place  from  which 
they  had  come, — with  frequent  trips  back  to  the 
range.  The  love  for  the  ranch  had  delayed  her 
d(3parture  from  year  to  year.  But  now  the  old 
familiar  buildings  were  gone  and  there  were  no 
ties  to  hold  her  here,  or  even  to  call  her  back  once 
she  was  gone. 

Harris  rose  and  pointed,  rousing  her  from  her 
abstraction.  Down  in  the  valley  below  them 
filed  a  long  line  of  dusty  horsemen.  Behind 
them  came  two  men  wrangling  a  pack  string 
carrying  equipment  for  a  long  campaign. 

"  There  is  the  law! "  he  said.  "  That's  what  I 
brought  you  here  to  see.  It's  what  we've  been 
waiting  for.  That  is  the  first  outfit  of  its  sort 
ever  to  ride  these  hills.  There  have  been  gangs 
organized  by  one  brand  or  another  that  rode  out 
and  imposed  justice  of  their  own,  according  to 
their  own  ideas — and  the  next  day  perpetrated 
some  injustice  against  men  whose  ideas  were  op- 
posed to  theirs.  But  that  little  procession  stands 
for  organized  law! " 

She  turned  and  looked  behind  her  as  her  ear 
caught  the  thud  of  hoofs  and  jangle  of  equip- 
ment. The  Three  Bar  men  were  just  topping 
th(3  ridge. 

They  had  caught  up  a  number  of  the  horses  re- 
leased from  the  pasture  lot  by  the  stampede. 


272        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

Calico  and  her  ow^i  little  horse.  Papoose,  were 
among  them.  Waddles  and  Moore  brought  up 
the  rear  with  a  pack  train  loaded  with  the  bed 
rolls  saved  from  the  bunk-house  fire. 

Harris  knew  that  action,  not  inaction  was  the 
best  outlet  for  her  energies,  temporarily  smoth- 
ered by  the  shock  of  the  raid.  It  was  not  in  her 
nature  to  sit  with  folded  hands  among  the  ruins 
of  the  ranch  and  patiently  wait  for  news. 

"  I  thought  maybe  you'd  like  to  go,"  he  said. 
"  The  jaunt  will  do  you  good." 

She  showed  the  first  sign  of  interest  she  had 
evidenced. 

"  And  we're  going  to  the  Breaks,"  she  stated. 

"  That's  where,"  he  said.  ''  We'll  order  them 
to  give  up  and  stand  trial.  They  won't.  Then 
we'll  clean  them  out.  Hunt  them  down  like 
rats !  We've  only  been  waiting  for  folks  to  wake 
up  to  the  fact  that  they  were  sick  of  having  the 
country  run  by  men  like  Slade  and  harassed  by 
the  wild  bunch — and  till  after  we'd  picked  up 
Slade.  The  way  it's  transpired  we'd  maybe  have 
done  better  to  ride  over  a  week  ago." 

The  little  band  in  the  valley  was  drawing  near. 
She  recognized  Carp,  Bentley  and  another  Slade 
man  riding  with  the  sheriff  at  their  head. 

"  What's  Bentley  doing  there?  "  she  asked. 

"  One  of  Carp's  men,"  Harris  said.  "  If  any 
of  them  get  away  from  us  Carp  will  hound  them 
down.     He  wears  the  U.  S.  badge  and  won't  be 


J 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        273 

sioj)ped  by  any  feeling  about  crossing  the  Utah 
or  Idaho  lines.  Rustling  is  of  no  interest  to  him. 
That's  the  sheriff's  job.  But  Carp  will  round 
them  up  for  obstructmg  the  homestead  laws." 

The  Three  Bar  men  came  up  and  halted. 
Karris  and  the  girl  changed  mounts  and  led  their 
men  down  to  join  the  file  of  riders  below.  As 
she  rode  she  speculated  as  to  Carlos  Deane's  sen- 
sations if  he  could  but  know  that  she  rode  at  the 
head  of  thirty  men  to  raid  the  stronghold  Harris 
had  once  pointed  out  to  him  from  the  rims. 

For  hours  they  rode  at  a  shufl9ing  trot  that  cov- 
ei-ed  the  miles.  It  was  well  after  simdown  when 
they  halted  in  a  sheltered  valley.  Waddles 
cooked  a  meal  over  an  open  fire.  Bed  rolls  were 
si)read  and  the  men  were  instantly  asleep.  Three 
hours  before  sunup  the  cook  was  once  more  busy 
round  a  fire.  The  men  slept  on,  undisturbed  by 
the  sounds,  but  when  he  issued  the  summons  to 
rise  they  rolled  out.  In  a  space  of  five  minutes 
e^ery  man  was  eating  his  meal;  for  they  were 
possessed  of  that  characteristic  which  marks  only 
the  men  who  live  strenuously  and  much  in  the 
oj)en, — the  ability  to  fall  instantly  asleep  after  a 
hard  day  and  to  wake  as  abruptly,  every  faculty 
alert  with  the  opening  of  their  eyes. 

The  meal  was  bolted.  The  men  detailed  to 
guard  the  horses  hazed  them  into  a  rope  corral. 
Saddles  were  hastily  cinched  on  and  the  men  rode 
of?  through  the  gloom,  leaving  Waddles  and 


274        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

three  others  to  pack  and  follow  later  in  the  day. 
Each  man  lashed  a  generous  lunch  on  his  saddle 
before  riding  off. 

They  held  a  stiff  trot  and  in  an  hour  out  from 
camp  they  struck  rough  going,  the  choppy  nature 
of  the  country  announcing  that  they  were  in  the 
edge  of  the  Breaks.  The  horses  slid  down  into 
cut-bank  washes  and  bad-land  cracks,  following 
the  bottoms  to  some  feasible  point  of  ascent  in  the 
opposite  wall.  Daylight  found  them  twenty 
miles  from  camp  and  the  horses  were  breathing 
hard.  They  turned  into  a  coulee  threaded  by  a 
well-worn  trail.  Three  miles  along  this  Bentley 
turned  to  the  right  up  a  branching  gulch  with 
eight  men.  Another  mile  and  Carp  led  a  similar 
detachment  off  to  the  left.  Billie  rode  with  the 
sheriff  and  Harris  at  the  head  of  the  rest,  holding 
to  the  beaten  trail. 

"  They  had  hours  the  start  of  us,"  Harris  said. 
"  They'd  catch  up  fresh  horses  on  the  range  and 
keep  on  till  they  got  in  sometime  in  the  night." 

He  motioned  to  Billie. 

"  You  fall  back,"  he  said.  The  men  had  drawn 
their  rifles  from  the  scabbards.  "  They  never 
did  post  a  guard.  It  wouldn't  occur  to  Lang 
that  such  a  force  could  be  mustered  and  start  out 
short  of  a  month.  If  he  thought  so  they'd  be  out 
of  here  and  scattered  instead  of  having  a  lookout 
along  the  trail.  But  there's  just  a  chance.  So 
for  a  little  piece  you'd  better  bring  up  the  rear." 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        275 

She  started  to  dissent  but  the  sheriff  seconded 
Harris's  advice. 

"  You  move  along  back,  Billie,"  he  said.  He 
patted  her  shoulder  and  smiled.  "  I'm  a-running 
this  layout  and  if  you  don't  mind  the  old  sheriff 
he'll  have  to  picket  you." 

She  nodded  and  pulled  PajDOOse  out  of  the 
trail  till  the  others  filed  by,  ridmg  with  Home  in 
rear  of  the  rest. 

The  party  halted  while  Harris  dismounted  to 
examine  the  trail.  It  was  hard-packed  but  the 
scant  signs  showed  that  shod  horses  had  come  in 
since  any  had  gone  out. 

"At  least,  there's  some  of  them  back,"  he  said. 
"  Likely  all." 

"  Lang  is  busy  gloating  over  the  fact  that  the 
Three  Bar  is  sacked,"  Alden  said.  "  Figuring 
that  the  whole  country  will  be  afraid  of  him  now 
and  that  his  friends  will  stand  by — ^without  a 
thought  that  his  neck  will  maybe  get  stretched  a 
foot  long  before  night." 

Harris  turned  up  a  side  pocket  and  the  men 
wr  ited  while  he  and  the  sheriff  climbed  a  ridge  on 
foot  to  investigate.     Harris  motioned  to  the  girl. 

'  Come  along  up  where  you  can  see,"  he  said 
an  i  she  followed  them  up  the  ridge.  Two  hun- 
dr(3d  yards  from  the  horses  they  came  out  on  a 
crest  which  afforded  a  view  of  the  basin  that  shel- 
tered Lang's  stockade. 

From  behind  a  sage-clump  Harris  trained  his 


276        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

glasses  on  the  group  a  mile  out  across  the  shallow 
basin.  Smoke  rose  from  the  chimney  of  the  main 
building.  Two  men  stood  before  a  teepee  near 
the  stockade.  There  were  two  other  tents  inside 
the  structure,  with  a  number  of  men  moving 
about  them.  Three  sat  on  the  ground  with  their 
backs  against  the  log  walls  of  the  main  house. 
Thirty  or  more  horses  fed  in  a  pasture  lot  and  a 
little  band  of  eight  or  ten  stood  huddled  together 
inside  the  stockade  at  the  far  end  from  the  tents. 

He  handed  his  glasses  to  the  girl. 

"  We'll  be  starting,"  he  said.  "  By  the  time 
we  get  fixed  the  rest  will  be  closing  in.  You  stay 
here  and  watch  the  whole  thing." 

"  I'm  going  along,"  she  said. 

The  sheriff  demurred. 

**  It  will  be  dirty  business  down  there — once  we 
start,"  he  said.  "  Business  for  men ;  and  you're  a 
better  man  than  most  of  us,  girl;  but  you  surely 
didn't  reckon  that  Cal  and  me  would  let  you  go 
careening  down  in  gunshot  of  that  hornet's  nest." 

"  I'm  as  good  a  shot  as  there  is  in  the  hills,"  she 
said.     "And  it  was  my  ranch  they  burned." 

The  sheriff  shoved  back  his  hat  and  pushed  his 
fingers  through  his  mop  of  gray  hair. 

"  Fact,"  he  confessed.  "  Every  word.  But 
there's  swarms  of  men  in  this  country — and  such 
a  damn  scattering  few  of  girls  that  we  just  can't 
take  the  risk.  That's  how  it  is.  If  you  don't 
promise  to  stay  out  of  it  we'll  have  to  detail  a 


I 


ji 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        277 

couple  of  the  boys  to  ride  guard  on  you  till  it's 
over  with." 

She  knew  that  the  other  men  would  back  Har- 
ris and  Alden  in  their  verdict.  She  nodded  and 
w^atched  them  turn  back  toward  the  horses.  She 
wanted  to  lead  her  men  down  in  a  wild  charge  on 
the  stockade,  shooting  into  it  as  she  rode,  aveng- 
ing the  sack  of  the  Three  Bar  in  a  smashing  fight. 

But  there  was  nothing  spectacular  in  the  at- 
tack of  Harris  and  the  sheriff.  They  went  about 
it  as  if  hunting  vermin,  cautiously  and  systemat- 
ically, taking  every  possible  advantage  of  the 
enemy  with  the  least  possible  risk  to  their  men. 

An  hour  after  the  two  men  had  left  her  she 
saw  a  figure  off  to  the  right.  She  trained  the 
glasses  on  it  and  saw  that  it  was  Alden  moving 
toward  the  buildings.  She  swept  the  glasses 
round  the  edge  of  the  circular  basin.  From  all 
sides,  from  the  mouth  of  every  coulee  that  opened 
into  it,  dark  specks  were  converging  upon  the 
stockade.  Some  of  them  stood  erect,  others 
crouched,  while  a  few  sprawled  flat  and  crawled 
for  short  distances  before  rising  and  moving  on. 

From  her  point  of  vantage  it  seemed  that  those 
round  the  buildings  must  see  them  as  clearly  as 
slie  did  herself;  but  she  laiew  they  were  keeping 
well  out  of  sight,  taking  advantage  of  eveiy  con- 
cealing  wave  of  ground  and  all  inequalities  of 
surface.  The  advance  was  slower  as  they  closed 
in  on  the  stockade.     There  was  a  sudden  commo- 


278        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

tion  among  the  men  at  the  buildings.  They  were 
moving  swiftly  mider  cover.  Some  of  the  at- 
tacking force  had  been  seen.  The  majority  of 
the  rustlers  took  to  the  stockade.  Four  ran  into 
the  main  cabin. 

It  was  as  if  she  gazed  upon  the  activities  of  bat- 
tling ants,  the  whole  game  spread  out  in  the  field 
of  her  glasses.  There  came  a  lull  in  the  action 
and  she  knew  that  the  sheriff  had  raised  his  voice 
to  summon  them  to  come  out  without  their  guns 
and  go  back  as  prisoners  to  stand  trial  for  every 
crime  under  the  sun. 

Not  a  shot  had  been  fired.  One  after  another 
she  picked  up  the  men  with  her  glasses.  Occa- 
sionally one  moved,  hitching  himself  forward  to 
some  point  which  afforded  a  better  view.  One 
or  two  knelt  in  the  bottom  of  shallow  draws,  peer- 
ing from  behind  some  sheltering  bush.  Inside 
the  stockade  she  could  see  Lang's  men  kneeling 
or  flattened  on  the  ground  as  they  gazed  through 
cracks  in  the  walls. 

She  made  out  Harris,  crouching  in  a  draw.  A 
thin  haze  of  smoke  spurted  from  his  position. 
Three  similar  puffs  showed  along  the  face  of  the 
stockade.  Then  the  i  sounds  of  the  shots  drifted 
to  her, — faint,  snappy  reports.  Harris  had 
dropped  flat  and  shifted  his  position  the  instant 
he  fired.  A  dozen  shots  answered  the  smoke- 
puffs  along  the  stockade. 

Throughout  the  next  half-hour  there  was  not 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        279 

shot  fired  in  the  flat ;  no  general  bombardment,  no 
wild  shooting,  but  guerilla  warfare  where  every 
man  held  his  fire  for  a  definite  human  target.  A 
man  shifted  his  position  in  the  stockade,  raised  to 
peer  from  a  hole  breast  high,  and  she  saw  him 
X)itch  down  on  the  ground  before  the  sound  of  the 
shot  reached  her.  One  of  her  men  had  noted  the 
darkening  of  the  crack  and  had  searched  him  out 
with  a  rifle  shot.  Three  shots  answered  it  from 
the  main  cabin. 

The  thud  of  hoofs  on  the  trail  below  drew  her 
eyes  that  way.  Waddles  was  riding  out  into  the 
biisin.  He  had  brought  the  pack  string  up  to 
some  point  near  at  hand  and  deserted  it  to  the 
ciire  of  the  others  while  he  rode  on  ahead  to  join 
m  the  fight.  He  was  almost  within  gunshot  of  the 
place  before  he  dismounted  and  allowed  the  horse 
to  graze.  She  watched  his  progress  as  he  cov- 
ered the  last  half-mile  on  foot.  He  had  dis- 
carded his  heavy  chaps,  his  blue  and  white  shirt 
and  overalls  giving  him  the  appearance  of  some 
great  striped  beetle  as  he  crawled  up  a  shallow  ra- 
vine. The  figures  were  small  from  distance, 
even  when  viewed  through  the  glasses,  thus  lend- 
ing her  a  feeling  of  detachment  and  lessening  the 
personal  element  and  the  grim  reality  of  the 
scene.  Rather  it  was  as  if  she  gazed  into  some 
instrument  which  portrayed  the  moves  of  manni- 
kins ;  yet  the  scene  wholly  absorbed  her  interest. 

Waddles  cautiously  raised  his  head  for  a  view 


28o        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

of  the  stockade  and  she  could  see  his  convulsive 
duck  as  a  rifle  ball  tossed  up  a  si)urt  of  gravel 
round  it.  The  man  who  had  fired  the  shot  went 
down  as  the  sheriff  drilled  the  spot  where  a  faint 
haze  of  smoke  had  shown. 

She  presently  noted  one  of  her  men  sitting 
under  a  sheltering  bank  and  eating  his  lunch. 
She  looked  at  her  watch ;  it  was  after  three, — the 
day  more  than  half  gone  and  less  than  a  hundred 
shots  had  been  fired.  Five  men  were  down  in  the 
stockade. 

The  sun  was  sinking  and  the  higher  points 
along  the  west  edge  of  the  basin  were  sending 
long  shadows  out  across  the  flats  before  there  was 
further  action  except  for  an  occasional  shifting 
of  positions.  Those  remaining  alive  in  the  stock- 
ade were  saddling  the  bunch  of  horses  kept  inside. 
These  were  led  close  under  the  fence  on  her  side 
where  she  could  no  longer  see  them. 

The  shadows  lengthened  rapidly  and  her  view 
through  the  glasses  was  beginning  to  blur  when 
the  gates  of  the  stockade  swung  back  and  five 
horses  dashed  out,  running  at  top  speed  under  the 
urge  of  the  spurs.  A  rider  leaned  low  upon  the 
neck  of  each  horse  and  they  scattered  wide  as 
they  fanned  out  across  the  basin,  a  wild  stampede 
for  safety,  every  man  for  himself. 

She  saw  one  man  lurch  sidewise  and  slip  to  the 
ground;  another  straightened  in  the  saddle, 
swung  for  two  jumps,  and  slid  off  backwards 


Ji 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        281 

across  the  rump  of  his  mount.  She  saw  the  great 
striped  bug  which  was  Waddles  rise  to  his  knees 
in  the  path  of  a  third.  The  rider  veered  his 
mount  and  swung  from  the  saddle,  clinging  alpng 
the  far  side  of  the  running  horse.  Then  man  and 
Iiorse  went  down  together  and  neither  rose. 
Waddles  had  shot  straight  through  the  horse  and 
reached  the  mark  on  the  other  side.  The  shoot- 
ing ceased  when  six  shots  had  been  fired.  Four 
riderless  horses  were  careening  round  the  basin. 
Five  hits  out  of  six,  she  reflected;  perhaps  six 
straight  hits. 

The  stockade  was  empty,  leaving  only  the  four 
in  the  house  to  be  accounted  for.  The  dark  specks 
in  the  brush  were  working  closer  to  the  house,  ef- 
fectually blocking  escape.  Then  she  could  no 
longer  make  them  out.  The  building  showed 
only  as  a  darker  blot  in  the  obscurity.  A  tiny 
j)oint  of  light  attracted  her  eye.  It  grew  and 
spread.  She  knew  that  one  of  her  men  had 
crawled  up  under  cover  of  night  and  fired  the 
house.  It  w^as  now  but  a  question  of  minutes,  but 
the  sight  oppressed  her.  She  thought  of  the 
burning  buildings  on  the  Three  Bar  and  rose  to 
make  her  way  back  to  the  pocket  where  the  horses 
had  been  left  in  the  care  of  a  deputy. 

"  It  will  be  over  in  an  hour,"  she  told  the  horse 
guard. 

All  through  the  day  she  had  scarcely  moved 
and  she  was  tired.    The  hours  of  inactivity  had 


282        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

proved  more  wearing  than  a  day  in  the  saddle. 
Harris  and  the  sheriff  came  in  with  their  detail. 
There  were  no  prisoners. 

"  So  they  wouldn't  give  up  even  when  they  was 
burnt  out,"  the  horse  guard  commented.  "  I 
thought  maybe  a  few  would  march  out  and  sur- 
render." 

"  I'd  sort  of  hoped  we'd  have  one  or  two  left 
over  so  we  could  put  on  a  trial,"  the  sheriff  said. 
"  There  was  three  come  out.  But  the  light  was 
poor  and  all.  Maybe  they  did  aim  to  surrender. 
It's  hard  to  say.  But  if  they  did — why,  some  of 
the  Three  Bar  boys  read  the  signs  wrong.  Any- 
way, there  won't  be  any  trial." 

They  rode  to  the  sheltered  box  canyon  where 
Waddles  had  left  the  pack  train.  A  little  later 
Bentley's  men  rode  up  and  five  minutes  behind 
them  came  Carp  with  the  rest.  The  bed  rolls 
were  spread  among  the  stunted  cedars  on  the 
floor  of  the  canyon  and  all  hands  turned  in.  At 
daylight  the  long  return  journey  to  the  Three 
Bar  was  commenced.  The  horses  were  tired  and 
the  back  trip  was  slow.  They  camped  for  the 
night  twenty  miles  out  from  the  ranch  and  before 
noon  of  the  next  day  the  sheriff  and  the  marshals 
had  split  off  with  their  men,  leaving  the  Three 
Bar  crew  to  ride  the  short  intervening  space  to 
the  ranch  alone. 

As  she  neared  the  edge  of  the  Crazy  Loop  val- 
ley the  girl  dreaded  the  first  glimpse  of  the  pil- 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        283 

laged  ranch.  For  the  first  time  it  occurred  to 
her  to  wonder  at  the  speed  with  which  Harris  had 
planned  and  executed  the  return  raid  while  the 
Three  Bar  still  burned. 

"  How  did  you  get  word  to  them  all? "  she 
asked.    "  Did  you  have  it  all  planned  before?  " 

"  It  was  Carp,"  he  said.  "  One  of  Lang's  men 
rode  down  to  inquire  for  Morrow  and  told  Carp 
the  cows  were  gathered  for  the  run  and  held  near 
the  Three  Bar.  They  figured  Carp  was  a  pal  of 
Morrow's  and  all  right.  It  was  near  morning 
then.  Carp  sent  Bentley  fanning  for  Coldriver 
to  see  if  the  sheriff  was  back  and  to  bring  out  the 
posse  if  he  hadn't  turned  up.  He  started  out  for 
the  Three  Bar  himself.  The  run  was  under  way 
when  he  came  in  sight  so  he  cut  over  and  headed 
the  mule  teams  at  the  forks  and  turned  them 
back,  then  kept  on  after  the  boys  at  Brill's.  Sent 
word  to  me  by  Evans  to  meet  them  where  we 
did." 

She  did  not  hear  the  latter  part  of  his  expla- 
nation for  thej^  had  reached  the  edge  of  the  valley 
and  she  looked  do^^n  upon  the  ruins  of  her  ranch. 

"  Now  I'm  ready  to  go,"  she  said.  "  I'll  go 
and  see  what  Judge  Colton  wants." 

"  He  wanted  you  to  get  away  before  anything 
like  this  occurred,"  Harris  said.  "  I  knew  that 
maybe  we'd  have  tough  going  for  a  while  at  some 
critical  time  and  wanted  you  to  miss  all  of  that — 
to  come  back  and  find  the  Three  Bar  booming 


284        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

along  without  having  been  through  all  the  grief. 
So  I  wrote  him  to  urge  you  to  come." 

"  Well,  I'm  going  now,"  she  said.  "  I  don't 
need  to  be  urged." 

Three  of  the  homesteaders  had  been  detailed 
to  stay  at  the  ranch.  They  were  putting  up  a 
temporary  fence  across  the  lower  end  to  hold 
range  stock  back  from  the  trampled  crops  until 
a  permanent  one  could  be  built  and  linked  up 
with  the  side  fences  which  still  stood  intact.  She 
showed  no  interest  in  this.  The  sight  below 
turned  her  weak  and  sick.  She  wanted  but  to  get 
away  from  it  all. 

Harris  pointed  as  they  rode  down  the  slope. 
The  little  cabin  that  old  Bill  Harris  had  first 
erected  on  the  Three  Bar,  and  which  had  later 
sheltered  the  Warrens  when  they  came  into  pos- 
session of  the  brand,  stood  solid  and  unharmed 
among  the  blackened  ruins  which  hemmed  it  in  on 
all  sides. 

"  Look,  girl ! "  he  exclaimed  triumphantly. 
"  Look  at  that  little  house.  The  Three  Bar  was 
started  with  that !  We  have  as  much  as  our  folks 
started  with — and  more.  They  even  had  to  build 
that.    We'll  start  where  our  folks  did  and  grow." 


XVI 


Harris  sat  on  a  baggage  truck  and  regarded 
the  heap  of  luggage  somberly.  Way  off  in  the 
distance  a  dark  blot  of  smoke  marked  the  location 
of  the  onrushing  train  which  would  take  the 
Three  Bar  girl  away. 

"  Some  day  you'll  be  wanting  to  come  back, 
old  partner,"  he  predicted  hopefully. 

Billie  shook  her  head.  There  is  a  certain  re- 
lief which  floods  the  heart  when  the  worst  has 
passed.  Looking  forward  and  anticipating  the 
possible  ruin  of  the  Three  Bar,  she  had  thought 
such  a  contingency  would  end  her  interest  in  life 
and  she  had  resolutely  refused  to  look  beyond 
it  into  the  future.  Now  that  it  was  wrecked  in 
reality  she  found  that  she  looked  forward  with 
a  faint  interest  to  what  the  future  held  in  store 
for  her, — that  it  was  the  past  in  which  her  inter- 
est was  dead. 

"  Not  dead,  girl;  only  dormant,"  Harris  said, 
when  she  remarked  upon  this  fact.  "  Like  a  seed 
in  frozen  ground.  In  the  spring  it  will  come  to 
h'fe  and  sprout.  The  Three  Bar  isn't  hurt. 
We're  in  better  shape  than  ever  before  and  a 
clear  field  out  in  front ;  for  the  country  is  cleaned 
up  and  the  law  is  clamped  on  top." 


286        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

She  honestly  tried  to  rouse  a  spark  of  interest 
deep  within  her,  some  ray  of  enthusiasm  for  the 
future  of  the  Three  Bar.  But  there  was  no  re- 
si)onse.  She  assured  herself  again  that  the  old 
brand  which  had  meant  so  much  to  her  meant  less 
than  nothing  now.    That  part  of  her  was  dead. 

The  trail  of  smoke  was  drawing  near  and  there 
was  a  rhythmic  clicking  along  the  rails.  Harris 
leaned  and  kissed  her. 

"  Just  once  for  luck,"  he  said,  and  slipped  from 
his  seat  on  the  truck  as  the  train  roared  in.  It 
halted  with  a  screech  of  brakes  and  he  handed 
her  up  the  steps. 

"  Good-by,  little  fellow,"  he  said.  "  I'll  see 
you  next  round-up  time." 

As  the  train  slid  away  from  the  station  she 
looked  from  her  window  and  saw  him  riding  up 
the  single  street  on  the  big  paint-horse.  The 
train  cleared  the  edge  of  the  little  town  and 
passed  the  cattle  chute.  A  long  white  line 
through  the  sage  marked  the  course  of  the  Cold- 
river  Trail.  Three  wagons,  each  drawn  by  four 
big  mules,  moved  toward  the  cluster  of  buildings 
which  comprised  the  town,  the  freighters  on  their 
way  to  haul  out  materials  for  the  rebuilding  of 
the  ranch. 

The  work  was  going  on  but  she  no  longer  had 
a  share  in  it.  She  was  looking  ahead  and  plan- 
ning a  future  in  which  the  Three  Bar  played  no 
part. 


Jj 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        287 

Deane  was  with  Judge  Colton,  her  father's  old 
friend,  to  meet  her  at  the  station.  The  news  of 
the  Three  Bar  fight  had  preceded  her  and  the 
press  had  given  it  to  the  world,  including  her 
part  of  it.  As  they  rode  toward  the  Colton  home 
she  told  the  Judge  she  had  come  to  stay  and 
Deane  was  content.  After  the  strenuous  days 
slie  had  just  passed  through  she  needed  a  long 
period  of  rest,  he  reflected;  but  the  older  man 
smiled  when  he  suggested  this. 

"What  she  needs  now  is  action,"  he  said. 
"  And  no  rest  at  all.  If  it  was  me  I'd  try  to  wear 
her  down  instead  of  resting  her  up — keep  her 
busy  from  first  to  last.  Cal  Warren's  girl  isn't 
the  sit-around  type." 

Deane  acted  on  this  and  no  day  passed  with- 
out his  having  planned  a  part  of  it  to  help  fill  her 
time.  Her  interest  in  the  new  life  was  genuine 
and  she  was  conscious  of  no  active  regret  at  part- 
ing from  the  old.  It  was  so  different  as  to  seem 
part  of  another  world.  The  people  she  met,  their 
mode  of  life,  their  manner  of  speech;  all  were 
foreign  to  the  customs  of  the  range.  And  this 
very  dissimilarity  kept  her  interest  alive  until 
she  grew  to  feel  that  she  belonged. 

AH  through  the  fall  and  early  winter  she  had 
scarcely  an  idle  hour.  Her  days  here  were  al- 
most as  fully  occupied  as  they  had  been  before. 
And  in  the  late  winter,  after  having  visited  other 
school  friends  who  lived  farther  east,  she  found 


288        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

herself  anticipating  the  return  to  the  Colton 
home  as  eagerly  as  always  in  the  past  she  had 
looked  forward  to  seeing  the  Three  Bar  after  a 
long  period  away  from  it. 

The  grip  of  winter  was  receding  and  a  few 
of  the  hardier  trees  w^ere  putting  out  buds  when 
she  returned.  Every  evening  Deane  was  with 
her  and  together  they  planned  tlie  next,  as  once 
she  and  Harris  had  planned  before  her  fireplace 
in  the  old  ranch  house.  For  the  first  time  in  her 
life  she  was  glad  to  be  sheltered  and  pampered 
as  were  other  girls.  Gliding  servants  anticipated 
her  wishes  and  carried  them  out.  But  with  it  all 
there  was  a  growing  restlessness  within  her, — a 
vague  dissatisfaction  for  which  she  could  not  ac- 
count. She  groped  for  an  answer  but  the  analy- 
sis could  not  be  expressed  or  definitely  cleared  in 
her  mind. 

She  sat  in  the  Colton  library  waiting  for  Deane 
to  come  and  take  her  to  a  lakeside  clubhouse  for 
the  evening.  Tiny  leaves  showed  on  the  trees 
and  the  lawn  was  a  smooth  velvet  green. 

Slade's  words  of  the  long  ago  recurred  to  her. 

"  A  soft  front  lawn  to  range  in,"  she  quoted 
aloud.  The  reason  for  her  restlessness  came  with 
the  words. 

Deane  planned  with  her  of  evenings  but  the 
planning  was  all  of  play.  No  word  of  work  crept 
into  it.  If  only  he  would  accept  her  as  wholly 
into  that  part  of  his  life  as  he  did  into  the  rest. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        289 

She  suddenly  felt  that  he  was  excluding  her  from 
something  it  was  her  right  to  share.  Their  plan- 
ning together  was  not  constructive  but  some- 
thing which  led  nowhere,  a  restless,  hectic  rush 
for  amusements  which  she  enjoyed  but  which 
could  not  make  up  the  whole  of  her  life.  Always 
she  had  said  that  men  went  to  extremes  and  made 
of  their  wives  either  drudges  or  little  tinsel 
quc^ens.  They  never  followed  the  middle  course 
and  made  them  full  partners  through  thick  and 
thin. 

jind  suddenly  she  longed  to  sit  for  just  one 
evening  before  the  fire  and  plan  real  work  with 
Cal  Harris.  He  had  been  the  one  man  she  had 
Iviiown  who  had  asked  that  she  work  with  him,  in- 
stead of  insisting  that  she  work  for  him, — or  that 
he  should  work  for  her.  She  had  drifted  along, 
expecting  that  that  same  state  of  affairs  would 
go  on  indefinitely,  believing  that  he  filled  the  void 
left  by  old  Cal  Warren.  But  now  she  knew  he 
held  that  place  he  had  created  for  himself.  They 
had  worked  together  and  she  had  deserted 
the  sinking  ship  to  play  the  part  of  the  tinsel 
queen. 

The  men  would  be  just  in  from  the  horse 
round-up  and  breaking  out  the  remuda,  prepara- 
tory to  starting  after  the  calves.  She  pictured 
Waddles  bawling  the  summons  to  feed  from  the 
coolv-house  door.  She  was  conscious  of  a  flare — 
half    of    resentment,    half    of    apprehension — 


290        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

toward  Harris  for  not  having  sent  a  word  of  af- 
fairs at  the  ranch. 

"  There's  millions  of  miles  of  sage  just  out- 
side," she  quoted.  "  And  millions  of  cows — and 
girls."  Perhaps  he  had  gone  in  search  of  them. 
Perhaps,  after  all,  he  had  found  that  the  road  to 
the  outside  was  not  really  closed  as  he  had  once 
told  her  it  was. 

Judge  Colton  entered  the  room  and  inter- 
rupted her  reverie  by  handing  her  a  paper.  In 
the  first  black  headline  she  saw  S lade's  name  and 
Harris's ;  an  announcement  of  the  last  chapter  of 
the  Three  Bar  war. 

The  first  line  of  the  article  stated  that  Slade, 
the  cattle  king,  had  been  released.  There  was 
insufficient  proof  to  convict  on  any  count.  She 
felt  a  curious  little  shiver  of  fear  for  Harris  with 
Slade  once  more  at  large.  The  article  retold  the 
old  tale  of  the  fight  and  portrayed  Slade,  on  his 
release,  viewing  the  range  which  he  had  once 
controlled  and  finding  a  squatter  family  on  every 
available  ranch  site. 

She  had  a  flash  of  sympathy  for  Slade  as  she 
thought  his  sensations  must  have  been  similar  to 
her  own  when  she  had  looked  upon  the  ruins  of 
the  Three  Bar.  But  this  was  blotted  out  by  the 
knowledge  that  he  had  only  met  the  same  treat- 
ment he  had  handed  to  so  many  others;  that  he 
had  dropped  into  the  trap  he  had  built  for  her. 
She  found  no  real  sympathy  for  Slade, — only 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        291 

fear  for  Harris  since  Slade  was  freed.  The  old 
sense  of  responsibility  for  her  brand  had  been 
^vorn  too  long  to  be  shed  at  will.  She  knew  that 
now. 

"  I  suppose  you'll  be  surprised  to  hear  that  I'm 
going  back,"  she  said. 

Her  father's  old  friend  smiled  across  at  her  and 
puffed  his  pipe. 

"  Surprised! "  he  said.  "  Why,  I've  known  all 
along  you'd  be  going  back  before  long.  I  could 
have  told  you  that  when  you  stepped  off  the 
train." 

He  left  her  alone  with  Deane  when  the 
5  ounger  man  arrived.  She  plunged  into  her  sub- 
ject  at  once. 

"  I'm  sorry,"  she  said.  "  But  I'm  going  home. 
I'm  not  cut  out  for  this — not  for  long  at  one  time. 
In  ten  days  they'll  be  rounding  up  the  calves  and 
I'll  have  to  be  there.  I  want  to  smell  the  round- 
up fire  and  slip  my  twine  on  a  Three  Bar  calf; 
to  throw  my  leg  across  a  horse  and  ride,  and  feel 
the  wind  tearing  past.  I'm  longing  to  watch  the 
boys  topping  off  bad  ones  in  the  big  corral  and 
jerking  Three  Bar  steers.  It  will  always  be  like 
tliat  with  me.    So  this  is  good-by." 

Four  days  later,  in  the  early  evening,  the  stage 
pulled  into  Coldriver  with  a  single  passenger. 
The  boys  were  in  from  a  hundred  miles  around 
for  one  last  spree  before  round-up  time.  As  the 
stage  rolled  down  the  single  street  the  festivities 


292        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

were  in  full  swing.  From  one  lighted  doorway 
came  the  blare  of  a  mechanical  piano  accom- 
panied by  the  scrape  of  feet;  the  sound  of 
drunken  voices  raised  in  song  issued  from  the 
next;  the  shrill  laughter  of  a  dance-hall  girl,  the 
purr  of  the  ivory  ball  and  the  soft  clatter  of  chips, 
the  ponies  drowsing  at  the  hitch  rails  the  full 
length  of  the  street,  the  pealing  yelp  of  some 
over-enthusiastic  citizen  whose  night  it  was  to 
howl;  all  these  were  evidences  of  the  wide  dif- 
ference between  her  present  surroundings  and 
those  of  the  last  eight  months.  She  gazed  eagerly 
out  of  the  stage  window.  It  was  good  to  get 
back. 

Both  the  driver  and  the  shotgun  guard  who 
rode  beside  him  were  new  men  on  the  job  since 
she  had  left  and  neither  of  them  knew  the  identity 
of  their  passenger.  As  the  stage  neared  the 
rambling  log  hotel  where  she  w^ould  put  up  for 
the  night  a  compact  group  of  riders  swung  down 
the  street.  Her  heart  seemed  to  stop  as  she  rec- 
ognized the  big  paint-horse  at  their  head.  She 
had  not  fully  realized  how  much  she  longed  to 
see  Cal  Harris.  As  they  swept  past  she  recog- 
nized man  after  man  in  the  light  that  streamed 
from  the  doorways  and  dimly  illuminated  the 
wide  street. 

Instead  of  dismounting  in  a  group  they  sud- 
denly split  up,  as  if  at  a  given  signal,  scattering 
the  length  of  the  block  and  dismounting  singly. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        293 

There  was  something  purposeful  in  this  act  and  a 
vague  apprehension  superseded  the  rush  of  glad- 
ness she  had  experienced  with  the  first  unex- 
pected view  of  the  Three  Bar  crew.  Men  who 
stood  on  the  board  sidewalks  turned  hastily  in- 
side the  open  doors  as  they  glimpsed  the  riders, 
spreading  the  news  that  the  Three  Bar  had  come 
to  town.  The  driver  pulled  up  in  front  of  the 
one  hotel. 

"  It'll  come  off  right  now,"  he  said.  "  Blade's 
in  town." 

"  Sure,"  the  guard  replied.  "  Why  else  would 
Harris  ride  in  at  night  like  this  unless  in  answer 
to  Slade's  threat  to  shoot  him  down  on  sight? 
(Jet  the  girl  inside." 

The  reason  for  the  scattering  was  now  clear  to 
her.  Slade,  on  his  release,  had  announced  that 
he  would  kill  Harris  on  sight  whenever  he  ap- 
peared in  town.  Slade  had  many  friends.  The 
Three  Bar  men  were  scattered  the  length  of  the 
street  to  enforce  fair  play. 

The  guard  opened  the  door  and  motioned  her 
out  but  she  shook  her  head. 

"  I'm  going  to  stay  here,"  she  asserted. 

Her  answer  informed  him  of  the  fact  that  she 
was  no  casual  visitor  but  one  who  knew  the  signs 
and  would  insist  on  seeing  it  through.  He 
nodded  and  shut  the  door. 

Harris  had  dismounted  at  the  far  end  of  the 
block  and  was  strolling  slowly  down  the  board 


294        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

sidewalk  on  the  oj)posite  side.  Groups  of  men 
packed  the  doorways,  each  one  striving  to  appear 
unconcerned,  as  if  his  presence  there  was  an  ac- 
cident instead  of  being  occasioned  by  knowledge 
that  something  of  interest  would  soon  transj)ire. 
A  man  she  knew  for  a  Slade  rider  moved  out  to 
the  edge  of  the  sidewalk  across  the  street  from 
Harris.  She  saw  the  Imnbering  form  of  Wad- 
dles edging  up  beside  him.  Other  Three  Bar 
boys  were  watching  every  man  who  showed  a  dis- 
position to  detach  himself  from  the  groups  in 
the  doors.  The  blare  of  the  piano  and  all  sounds 
of  revelry  had  hushed. 

The  girl  felt  the  clutch  of  stark  fear  at  her 
heart.  She  had  come  too  late.  Harris  was  to 
meet  Slade.  It  seemed  that  she  must  die  with 
him  if  he  should  pass  out  before  she  could  speak 
to  him  again  and  tell  him  she  was  back.  She  had 
a  wild  desire  to  run  to  him, — at  least  to  lean  from 
the  window  and  call  out  to  him  to  mount  Calico 
and  ride  away.  But  she  knew  he  would  not. 
She  was  frontier  bred.  Even  the  knowledge  that 
she  was  in  town  might  unsteady  him  now.  She 
sat  without  a  move  and  the  driver  and  guard  out- 
side supposed  her  merely  a  curious  on-looker  in- 
terested in  the  scene. 

"  A  hundred  on  Harris,"  the  driver  offered. 

The  guard  grunted  a  refusal. 

"  I'd  bet  that  way  myself,"  he  said. 

From  this  she  knew  that  the  two  men  were 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        295 

hoping  Harris  would  be  the  one  to  survive;  but 
the  fact  that  their  proffered  bets  backed  their 
sentiments  was  no  proof  that  they  felt  the  con- 
viction of  their  desire.  She  knew  the  men  of 
their  breed.  No  matter  how  small  the  chance, 
their  money  would  inevitably  be  laid  on  the  side 
of  their  wishes,  never  against  them,  as  if  the  wa- 
gering of  a  long  shot  was  proof  of  their  confi- 
dence and  might  in  some  way  exercise  a  favorable 
influence  on  the  outcome.  No  man  had  ever 
stood  against  Slade.  She  noted  Harris's  gun. 
He  carried  it  with  the  same  awkward  sling  as  of 
old,  on  the  left  side  in  front  with  the  butt  to  the 
right. 

"  Fifty  on  Slade,"  a  voice  offered  from  the 
doorway  of  the  hotel.  The  guard  started  for  the 
spot  but  the  bet  was  snapped  up  by  another. 
Wild  fighting  rage  swept  through  her  at  the 
thought  that  to  all  these  men  it  was  but  a  sport- 
ing event. 

Her  eyes  never  once  left  Harris  as  he  came 
down  the  street.  A^^en  almost  abreast  of  the 
stage  Slade  stepped  from  a  doorway  twenty  feet 
in  before  him  and  stopped  in  his  tracks.  Harris 
turned  on  one  heel  and  stood  with  his  left  side 
quartering  toward  Slade, — the  old  pose  she  re- 
membered so  well.  There  was  a  tense  quiet  the 
length  of  the  street. 

"  Those  you  hire  do  poor  work  from  behind," 
Harris  said.     "  Maybe  you  sometimes  take  a 


296        The  Settling  of  the  Sage  ^| 

chance  yourself  and  work  from  in  front."     His 
thumb  was  hooked  in  the  opening  of  his  shirt  just    Ml 
above  the  butt  of  his  gun. 

Slade  held  a  cigarette  in  his  right  hand  and 
raised  it  slowly  to  his  lips.  He  removed  it  and 
flicked  the  ash  from  the  end,  then  inspected  the 
results  and  snapped  it  again, — and  the  down- 
ward move  of  his  wrist  was  carried  through  in  a 
smooth  sweep  for  his  gim.  It  flashed  into  his 
hand  but  his  knees  sagged  under  him  as  a  forty- 
five  slug  struck  him  an  inch  above  the  buckle  of 
his  belt.  Even  as  he  toppled  forward  he  fired, 
and  Harris's  gun  barked  again.  Then  the  Three 
Bar  men  were  vaulting  to  their  saddles.  Evans 
careened  down  the  street,  leading  the  paint- 
horse,  and  within  thirty  seconds  after  Slade's 
first  move  for  his  gun  a  dozen  riders  were  turn- 
ing the  corner  on  the  run.  Before  the  spectators 
had  time  to  realize  that  it  was  over,  the  Three  Bar 
men  were  gone.    Slade  had  many  friends  in  town. 

The  girl  had  seen  Harris's  draw,  merely  a 
single  pull  from  left  to  right  and  by  his  quarter- 
ing pose  the  gun  had  been  trained  on  Slade  at 
the  instant  it  cleared  the  holster;  not  one  super- 
fluous move,  even  to  the  straightening  of  his 
wrist.    The  driver's  voice  reached  her. 

"  Fastest  draw  in  the  world  for  the  few  that 
can  use  it,"  he  said. 

The  guard  opened  the  door.  The  girl  was  sit- 
ting with  her  head  bowed  in  her  hands. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        297 

"  Don't  take  it  that  way,  Ma'am/'  he  coun- 
seled.    "  He  was  a  hard  one — Slade." 

But  he  had  misread  his  signs.  She  felt  no  re- 
gret for  Slade,  only  a  wave  of  thankfulness,  so 
powerful  as  almost  to  unnerve  her,  over  Harris's 
escape,  untouched.  She  accused  herself  of  cal- 
lousness but  the  spring  of  her  sympathy,  usually 
so  ready,  seemed  dry  as  dust  when  she  would 
have  wasted  a  few  drops  on  Slade. 

The  next  day,  in  the  late  afternoon,  Harris 
looked  up  and  saw  a  chap-clad  rider  on  the  edge 
of  the  valley.  She  had  ridden  over  unannounced 
on  a  horse  she  had  borrowed  from  Brill.  She  an- 
swered the  wave  of  his  hat  and  urged  the  horse 
down  the  slope.  He  met  her  at  the  mouth  of  the 
lane  and  together  they  walked  back  to  the  new 
buildings  of  the  ranch.  The  men  breaking 
horses  in  the  new  corrals  were  the  same  old  hands. 
The  same  old  Waddles  presided  over  the  new 
cook  shack.  Her  old  things,  rescued  from  the 
fire,  were  arranged  in  the  living  room  of  the  new 
house.  A  row  of  new  storerooms  and  the  shop 
stood  on  the  site  of  the  old.  And  in  the  midst  of 
all  the  improvements  the  old  cabin  first  erected 
on  the  Three  Bar  stood  protected  by  a  picket 
f(^nce  on  which  a  few  vines  were  already  begin- 
ning to  climb. 

"  It  didn't  take  long  to  throw  them  up,  with 
all  hands  working,  along  in  the  winter  when  there 
wasn't  much  else  to  do,"  he  said. 


298        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

After  the  men  had  quit  work  to  greet  the  re- 
turnmg  Three  Bar  boss  she  went  over  every  de- 
tail of  the  new  house.  The  big  living  room  and 
fireplace  were  modeled  closely  along  the  lines  of 
her  old  quarters;  heads  and  furs  were  on  the 
walls,  pelts  and  Indian  rugs  on  the  floors.  Run- 
ning water  had  been  piped  down  from  a  sidehill 
spring.  The  new  house  was  modernized.  Then 
Harris  saddled  Calico  and  Papoose  and  they 
rode  down  to  the  fields. 

As  they  turned  into  the  lane  they  heard  the 
twang  of  Waddles's  guitar  from  the  cook  shack, 
the  booming  voice  raised  in  song  in  mid-after- 
noon, a  thing  heretofore  unheard  of  in  the  annals 
of  Three  Bar  life. 

"  There'll  be  one  real  feast  to-night,"  Harris 
prophesied.    "  Waddles  will  spread  himself." 

They  rode  past  the  meadow,  covered  with  a 
knee-deep  stand  of  alfalfa  hay. 

"  It  was  only  tramped  doA\Ti,"  he  said.  "  She 
came  up  in  fine  shape  this  spring.  We'll  put  up 
a  thousand  tons  of  hay." 

He  held  straight  on  past  the  meadow,  turned 
off  below  the  lower  fence  and  angled  southwest 
across  the  range.  The  calves  and  yearlings  along 
their  route  gave  proof  that  the  grading-up  of  the 
Three  Bar  herds  was  already  having  its  effect. 
Ninety  per  cent,  were  straight  red  stock  with 
only  a  few  throwbacks  to  off -color  strains.  The 
two  spoke  but  little  and  near  sunset  they  rode  out 


J 


"It's  been  right  lonesome  planning  without  a  little  partner 
to  talk  it  all  over  with  at  night,"  he  said.     Page  299. 


The  Settling  of  the  Sage        299 

and  dismounted  on  the  ridge  from  which,  ahnost 
a  year  before,  they  had  viewed  the  first  move  of 
organized  law  in  the  Coldriver  strip. 

A  white-toj)ped  wagon  came  toward  them  up 
the  valley  along  the  same  route  followed  by  the 
file  of  dusty  riders  on  that  other  day.  A  woman 
held  the  reins  over  the  team  and  a  curly-haired 
youngster  jostled  about  on  the  seat  by  her  side. 
A  man  wrangled  a  nondescript  drove  of  horses 
and  cows  in  the  rear. 

"  That's  the  way  we  both  came  into  this  coun- 
try first,  you  and  I,"  Harris  said.  "  Just  like 
that  little  shaver  on  the  seat." 

"  Will  they  find  a  place  to  settle? "  she  asked, 
^vith  a  sudden  hope  that  the  newcomers  would 
find  a  suitable  site  for  a  home. 

"  Maybe  not  close  around  here,"  he  said. 
*'  Most  of  the  good  sites  you  can  get  water  on  are 
picked  up.  But  they'll  find  a  place  either  here 
or  somewhere  else  a  little  further  on." 

He  slipped  an  arm  about  her  shoulders. 

"  It's  been  right  lonesome  planning  without  a 
little  partner  to  talk  it  all  over  with  at  night," 
he  said.  "  Have  you  come  back  for  keej)s  to 
help  me  make  the  Three  Bar  the  best  outfit 
in  three  States?  I  can't  hold  down  that  job 
alone." 

She  nodded  and  leaned  against  him. 

"  That's  what  they  wanted— old  Bill  and  Cal,'* 
she  said.    "  But  it's  nice  that  we  want  it  too.    I've 


300        The  Settling  of  the  Sage 

come  for  keeps;  and  the  road  to  the  outside  is 
closed." 

They  stood  and  watched  the  sun  pitch  over  the 
far  edge  of  the  world ;  and  down  in  the  valley  be- 
low them  the  hopeful  squatters  were  looking  for 
a  place  to  camp. 


1 


1 

^ 


FACTS   ABOUT 

HAL  G.    EVARTS 


Author  of 

The  Passing  of  the  Old  West 

The  Yellow  Horde 


Mr.  Evarts  was  born  in  Topeka,  Kansas.  Always  a  lover  of 
nature  and  the  great  outdoors  of  which  he  writes  with  so  sure  a 
touch,  he  has  been  ranchman,  trapper  and  naturalist,  as  well 
as  novelist.  He  has  spent  his  life  among  the  Colorado  hills,  the 
forests  of  Wyoming  and  the  North,  and  on  the  desert  lands  of 
the  South.  It  is  small  wonder,  therefore,  that  descriptions  of  the 
great  wilderness,  and  the  portrayal  of  the  characteristics  and 
habits  of  the  wild  life  of  the  Yellowstone  Park,  —  the  theme  of 
"The  Passing  of  the  Old  West"  —  are  extremely  accurate,  reflect- 
ing unusual  powers  of  observation  and  broad  knowledge  of  natural 
history. 

Mr.  Evarts*  first  book  created  an  ever  increasing  demand  for 
his  delightful  sketches  of  animal  life,  filled  at  intervals  by  short 
stories  appearing  in  various  periodicals.  Last  summer  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Evarts  made  an  extensive  trip  through  the  remote  Canadian 
Northwest,  just  east  of  the  Yukon  country,  penetrating  as  far 
north  as  Fort  McPherson,  within  a  few  miles  of  the  Arctic  coast. 
It  is  to  be  Hoped  that  the  observations  of  this  trip  will  soon  be 
offered  in  book  form  to  his  many  readers  and  admirers. 


LITTLE,  BROWN  &  CO.,  Publishers 
34  Beacon  Street,  Boston 


1 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 
BERKELEY 

Return  to  desk  from  which  borrowed. 
This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


25Jan'5?0 
REC'D  LD 

APR  11 1957 


REC'D 

MARl 


LD 

1963 


■^>i„ll*»i  IWI     ^^^ 


LD  21-957n^ll,'50(2877sl6)476 


GEO.   A.  WHEELER 


YB  32593 


